THE 

FUNCTIONAL REORGANIZATION 

OF THE 

AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM 



By 

FRANK FOREST BUNKER 






THIS THESIS HAS BEEN ACCEPTED BY THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF NEW YORK 

UNIVERSITY. IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS 

FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 



THE 

FUNCTIONAL REORGANIZATION 

OF THE 

AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM 



By 

FRANK FOREST BUNKER 



v^ 



9/:2> 



THIS THESIS HAS BEEN ACCEPTED BY THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF NEW YORK 

UNIVERSITY, IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS 

FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 



■J3BS' 

i'1/3 



Gilt 
The Uui^«r»itf 

APR 29 »•• 



V 



cr 



CONTENTS. 



Page. 

Preface v 

Chapter I. — The rise of the chief division of the American public-school 

system 1 

II. — ^The rise of tlie graded school 19 

III. — ^Efforts toward a functional reorganization — The first decade 

of the discussion 40 

IV. — Efforts toward a functional reorganization — Second decade 

of the discussion 56 

V. — ^Efforts toward a functional reorganization — The practice 75 

VI. — ^The plan adopted by Berkeley, Cal 95 

VII. — The course of study — The first cycle 116 

VIII. — The course of study — The second and third cycles 136 

APPENDIX. 

Saginaw (East Side), Mich., courses of study 160 

A six-year high-school course 163 

Garfield Junior High School, Richmond, Ind., course of study 164 

Union school district, Concord, N. H., course of study for the high school_ 165 

Intermediate schools of Los Angeles, Cal., course of study 167 

Berkeley, Cal., courses of study 169 

Japan — Courses of study in the elementary schools 173 

Bibliography 177 

Index 183 

m 



f 



PEEFAOE. 



A little more than two decades ago Charles W. Eliot, convinced 
that the age at which the college graduate completes his course and 
begins supporting himself was too high, put the question. Can school 
programs be shortened and enriched? This query precipitated a 
discussion which, while ranging over the entire field of educational 
theory and practice, centered particularly upon the purpose and 
place of the common school, the high school, and the institutions of 
higher learning. This critical examination of the principal parts of 
the system has set in clearer light their characteristics and has led 
to the belief that a proper regard for the distinctive functions of 
each makes imperative a reorganization, or at least a readjustment, 
of the chief divisions of the system with respect to articulation, to 
internal organization, to grade span, and to defined purpose. 

Though the discussion started with a specific problem — the need of 
reducing the age of college graduates — the original question was 
quickly forgotten, and the discussion became wholly academic and so 
remained throughout the first decade. The opening of the second 
decade saw the discussion brought back to earth again by practical- 
minded administrators who sought a program of reorganization or 
of readjustment that gave reasonable promise of success. In conse- 
quence of this effort, plans for action emerged which are now being 
put to the test of practice. Thus the movement toward a functional 
reorganization of the school system may properly be said to have 
survived two of the stages through which every project, on its way 
from inception to practice, must necessarily pass : That of academic 
discussion, and that of a consideration of working plans. It is now 
entering the final stage, that of adoption and trial. 

The following is an attempt to set forth in orderly manner the 
progress of the movement as it has developed from its beginning to 
the present time. There is also an attempt to show, in some detail, 
how a regrouping of the grades of the system lends itself to changes 
in the elementary and secondary curricula that seem to be demanded. 

In treating the attempts which have been made to bring about this 
reorganization and the attendant effect upon courses of study, two 
alternatives were open : To describe, in as great detail as space would 
permit, a number of such efforts or to give a brief summary of the 
essential features of each, with a more detailed description of some 



VI REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

one experience. The latter alternative has been adopted, on the 
theory that a portrayal of the difficulties encountered in putting into 
operation a given plan, and a description of the effect upon the 
organization and curriculum of a single school department, even 
though such results fall short of the ideal, would prove more helpful. 
Among those who have rendered material assistance in the task of 
organizing the materials for this study it is a pleasure to make special 
mention of Dr. Eicharcl Gauss Boone, professor of education at the 
University of California. The study was begun in his seminar and 
progressed for a considerable time under his stimulating direction. 
Special thanks are also due to Profs. Thomas M. Balliet, Herman H. 
Home, Kobert MacDougall, James E. Lough, and Paul K. Radosavl- 
jevich, of New York University. 



REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 



Chapter I. 

THE RISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIONS OF THE AMERICAN 
PUBLIC=SCHOOL SYSTEM. 



Contents. — The three divisions — Distinct sources — Elementary division ; beginnings ; 
rotating schools ; school districts ; Government aid ; Northwest Territory ; Horace 
Mann ; Henry Barnard— Division of higher education ; colonial colleges ; preparation 
for the ministry ; place of Latin and Greek ; growth of the demand for higher educa- 
tion ; modifications in curricula ; departmental instruction ; election of studies ; 
period of internal development ; preparatory schools — Secondary division ; Latin 
grammar schools ; the Renaissance ; influence of local conditions ; the academy ; 
function ; industrial development ; free public high school ; original purpose ; later 
development. 



The American public-school system now stands, after three cen- 
turies of growth, complete in form only. Its three divisions — ele- 
mentary, secondary, and that embracing higher education — are 
joined together, end to end, forming a lineal whole. It is therefore 
now easy for a child of 6 to enter the elementary school, pass regu- 
larly from grade to grade, and finally to emerge, 16 or 18 years later, 
prepared as far as academic study is concerned to begin his life work, 
and without direct cost to himself or to his parents. 

The story of the development of this system is the story of the 
conflict between two demands : That for a college preparation on the 
one hand, and on the other for a noncollegiate preparation extending 
beyond the elementary grades. As in every country developing a 
system of education, the colleges reached downward to find a means 
of preparation for the few, while the elementary schools reached 
upward in order to secure an extension of a general, practical educa- 
tion for the many. It has remained for America alone to develop 
an institution which has harmonized the two — the free public high 
school. Inasmuch, however, as each of the three divisions comprising 
the system sprang from separate and distinct sources and grew to 
considerable proportions independently of the others, and in re- 
sponse to the shaping power of different conditions, the whole which 
the fusing process of recent years has given us is complete in form 
only. In organic relation, in sharpness of province, and in dis- 

1 



2 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

tinctiveness of function, these divisions are not yet satisfactorily 
articulated. 

The English colonists had scarcely set foot in the New World 
before they began planning for the education of their children. 
Within eight years after the founding of Boston a college with a 
system of preparatory schools was established, and within 17 years 
the foundation, in theory at least, of our entire American public- 
school system was laid. The acts of 1642 and 161T (Massachusetts)^ 
not only recognized each of the three divisions of our present sys- 
tem, but in addition enunciated the right of the State to compel 
proper provision for education, to determine the kind of an educa- 
tion which should be given, to provide such education by general 
tax and at public expense, and to provide opportunities for college 
preparation.^ While legislation has added but two important prin- 
ciples to those set forth in these early Massachusetts acts — compul- 
sory attendance and the making of free schooling mandatory — yet 
the educational system foreshadowed in the original principle has 
been exceedingly slow in unfolding, reaching a point in its develop- 
ment relatively complete only within the last half century. 

Though from the first there was a demand by the masses for the 
rudiments of an education, yet such instruction during the colonial 
period was meager and haphazard. Wliile the legislation of the 
time recognized the elementary school and made its support by pub- 
lic tax permissive, yet, except in the larger towns, such education 
was badly neglected. In some towns the parents instructed their 
children at home, or clubbed together and employed a young man 
or woman to give a start in reading and writing. In one town the 
children learned to write on birch bark and were taught in rotation 
by the men of the village who could read.^ In other places the min- 
ister became the schoolmaster. Even as late as 1817 the school com- 
mittee of Boston denied a petition, signed by 160 inhabitants, asking 
that primary schools be established at public expense, defending 
their denial on the ground that the establishment of such schools 
would be too expensive ; and, furthermore, " that most parents have 
some leisure, and that with us few are unequal to the task of teach- 
ing the elements of letters."^ 

Much of the elementary instruction which was provided in that 
day was given in vacant carpenters' shops, in spare rooms in old 
dwellings, in unoccupied barns, in basement rooms, and in such other 

1 For early Massachusetts statutes see Rep. U. S. Com. Ed., 1892-93, vol. 2, pp. 1225- 
1239. 

» See Martin, The Evolution of the Mass. Pub. Sch. System, pp. 12-17 ; Hinsdale, Hor- 
ace Mann, pp. 2-8. 

^ Martin, Evolution of the Mass. Pub. Sch. System, p. 68. 

* See the report of the committee in full : Wrightman, Annals of the Boston Primary 
School Committee, pp. 21-27. 



RISE OP THE CHIEF DIVISIONS. 3 

places as chance presented.^ The scope of the work offered in these 
schools before the Be volution was limited merely to writing and the 
rudiments of reading. Spelling and arithmetic as separate subjects 
were not required until well into the next century. The support of 
primary schools, as indeed of the grammar schools of the period, 
was various and uncertain. By lotteries, by land rentals, by private 
subscription, by licensing houses of entertainment, by tuition paid 
in money or in kind, as well as by general tax levied upon all people 
of a given community, these schools were maintained for brief 
periods during the year.^ As changing economic and social condi- 
tions operated to disperse the hitherto compact settlements, the 
school was often rotated from place to place within the community 
to meet the demands of those who settled at some distance from the 
center.^ In some towns it was kept for a third of the time in each 
end and a third in the middle; in other places it remained four 
months in each of three places; and in still others the school was 
shifted among five places within a single school year. Gloucester 
probably holds the record for the number of changes required, for 
in this community, in 1751, the grammar school rotated among so 
many places that the children at a given locality secured but one 
and a half months of schooling once in every three years.* As with 
Massachusetts, so with the other New England States, elementary 
education remained until the beginning of the nineteenth century 
informal, intermittent, unsystematic, voluntary in respect to both 
parents and community, and hence inefficient. 

The first real advance was made when the rotating school was 
superseded by the establishment of permanent schools at the several 
points comprising the itinerary of these "moving schools." At- 
tendance lines were drawn and a proportionate share of the school 
money was given to the people within the limits thus formed, to 
expend as they desired. In 1789 this division of the scattered com- 
munity into districts was recognized by law, but the act of 1789 
gave no power to the district. If a schoolhouse was to be built, for 
instance, it could be done only through subscriptions voluntarily 
given by the people. By 1827, however, through successive legis- 
lation, the district changed from a unit created for mere social con- 
venience to a political institution with power vested in its inhabi- 
tants to levy taxes, to hold meetings, to choose a clerk, to select a 
school site, to erect a building thereon, to enforce contracts, and to 
employ teachers." 

1 See U. S. Bu. of Educ, Contr. to Amer. Ed. Hist., No. 18, p. 21. 

2 Ibid., pp. 20, 21. 

^ For a discussiou of the causes producing the moving school see Opdegraflf, The Origin 
of the Moving School in Massachusetts. 

* Martin, Evolution of the Mass. P«b. Sch. System, pp. 75-77. 
s IWd., pp. 90-118. 



4 REOKGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Simultaneously with this movement in New England toward free 
public common schools the rapidly developing Northwest Territory 
was taking advanced ground in the same respect. One of the wisest 
as well as one of the last acts of the Congress of the Confederation 
was to provide a comprehensive plan for the government of the ter- 
ritory lying to the northwest of the Ohio River and for its future 
subdivision into States. In this act (the " Ordinance of 1787 ") Con- 
gress declared: 

Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and 
the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be 
encouraged/ 

Ten days after this ordinance was passed Congress adopted a sup- 
plementary act relating to the disposition of public lands that had 
a far-reaching effect in accelerating the rise of the common school 
and later of the State university. This act decreed that in every 
State formed out of the public domain the sixteenth section of each 
township therein should be set apart for the support of the common 
schools, and that not more than two complete townships were " to be 
given perpetually for the purposes of a seminary of learning [uni- 
versity], to be applied to the intended object by the legislature of the 
State." In 1803 the provisions of this ordinance were extended to 
the States of the Mississippi Territory, and in 1848 Congress enacted 
that in States thereafter formed the thirty-sixth section, in addition 
to the sixteenth section, should be reserved for the support of the 
common school.^ In consequence of this generous provision 67,000,000 
acres of land have been granted for common-school purposes.^ 

The final stage in the evolution of the modern highly organized 
and highly graded elementary school began, roughly dating, from the 
time when Horace Mann and Henry Barnard began their educational 
work — the one in Massachusetts (1837) and the other in Connecticut 
(1837) and later in Rhode Island (1843). For a time education had 
in considerable degree been neglected. The War of Independence, 
the formation of new States, the reclaiming of new territory, the 
building of canals and railroads diverted attention from the schools. 
The old laws making education compulsory were forgotten. Immi- 
gration was bringing many poor and ignorant families into the 
country. In consequence illiteracy was rapidly gaining ground. 
Under the leadership of Horace Mann and Henry Barnard, and 
largely through their personal efforts, a reaction set in. Associations 
to foster education were everywhere formed; journals for the dis- 
cussion of educational questions were founded in great numbers; 

1 See An Ordinance for tlie Oovernment of the Territory of the United States Northwest 
of the River Ohio, Third article, found in McMaster, Hist, of the People of the U. 8., 
Vol. Ill, ch. 16 ; also in Old South Leaflets, No. 18. 

2 See Swett, Amer. Pub. Schools, pp. 37-44. 
sTliwlng, A. Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., p. 189. 



KISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIOlSrS. 5 

many distinguished men visited Europe, examined the best systems, 
and returned to publish their observations and scatter them broad- 
cast among the people. Henry Barnard, intrusted with the task of 
reforming the schools of Rhode Island, merely preliminary to se- 
curing legislative reforms, went twice to all the towns in the State; 
talked personally with more than 400 teachers about their work, 
besides visiting their schools; wrote a thousand letters to persons 
best able to suggest valuable ideas ; delivered more than 500 addresses 
upon the needs of the schools; published a journal which was gratui- 
tously distributed throughout the community and organized every- 
where local associations to foster and spread the interest which he 
awakened. What Henry Barnard did in Rhode Island Horace Mann 
was doing in Massachusetts, with the result that apathy in educa- 
tional matters was changed to an enthusiasm that rapidly took on 
the characteristics of a popular movement. 

In the T5 years which have since elapsed a remarkable develop- 
ment of the functions and organization of the elementary division 
of the public-school system has taken place. Within the last three 
decades have come professionally trained instructors, expert super- 
vision, grouping by grades, supervision of the pupils' health, enrich- 
ment of courses, and the segregation of and special instruction for 
defectives, besides many other notable features, to which the present- 
day educator points with confidence and pride. 

In the rise of the college and university, together comprising the 
division of higher education, the demand of the American people 
for an education suitable for general culture and for the professions 
found its expression. The response of these institutions to the ex- 
panding needs of a rapidly growing country has not always been 
prompt. Nevertheless as the want increased and the demands be- 
came insistent, the college and university have slowly accommodated 
themselves thereto. At first it was the ministry only for which a col- 
lege education was desired. Now the universities of this country 
provide a training for entrance to all of a host of professions that 
the development in science, industry, and statecraft has created. 

The colonial colleges were dominated by the religious and ecclesi- 
astical influences of the time. Harvard was founded in part out of 
a " dread to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches when our 
present ministers shall lie in dust."^ For 60 years it was little more 
than a training school for ministers. The application for a charter 
permitting the founding of William and Mary was supported by the 
declaration that Virginians had souls to be saved as well as their 
English countrymen and that the institution was needed to prepare 
young men for the ministry.^ While there was nothing in Yale's 

1 Mass. Hist. Collections, Vol. I, p. 242. 

2 Boone, Ediic. in the U. S., p. 34. 



6 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

charter requiring a religious test for trustees, rectors, or tutors, yet 
those instrumental in its founding planned that it should be con- 
trolled by a synod of churches, and that it should be called the 
" School of the Church."^ Though this plan was not fully executed, 
the initial steps in founding the college were taken by a body which 
comprised the principal clergymen of New Haven Colony. Of the 
six remaining colleges established before the Revolution, only one 
(Philadelphia Academy, merged into the University of Pennsylva- 
nia) was nonsectarian. 

Princeton was founded primarily to secure a supply of ministers 
for the Presbyterian Churches of Maryland, Virginia, and the mid- 
dle Colonies. While it was controlled by Presbyterians, there was a 
larger lay membership in its governing board than had obtained at 
Harvard, William and Mary, or Yale.^ The Philadelphia Academy 
embodied in its constitution the idea of Benjamin Franklin. In this 
constitution there is no mention made of religion, of the church, or of 
the ministry,^ and in this respect the institution expressed a signifi- 
cant modern note. Two-thirds of the first board of trustees of King's 
College (now Columbia) were communicants of the Church of Eng- 
land, and, while the college was founded nominally as a civil institu- 
tion, the condition was exacted that the president of the college 
should be a member of the Episcopal Church and that the religious 
service of the college should be from the liturgy of that church.* 
Brown College (Providence, R. I.) was founded in response to defi- 
nite and formal action taken by the Baptist Association of Philadel- 
phia. Its charter opened the doors of the college to all denomina- 
tions of Protestants, expressly prohibiting any religious test for its 
members or students, yet affirming its connection with the church by 
requiring the president to be a member of the Baptist Church and 
placing the governing board under its control.^ Dartmouth College 
was the outgrowth of a plan projected by Rev. Eleazar "VVheelock 
to train Indians of both sexes in religious and secular learning, and 
to send them back to their tribes to be teachers and preachers.® One- 
half of the first board of trustees were Congregational ministers and 
the other half civil authorities of Connecticut Colony. The charter 
makes emphatic the original purpose of the institution — namely, " the 
spread of the Redeemer's Kingdom" — but it also makes clear that no 
one shall be excluded from its benefits because of denominational 

1 Boone, Educ. in the U. 8., pp.. 38, 39. 

»Thwing, A Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., pp. 109-112. 

« Ibid., p. 113. 

Mbld., pp. 117, 118. 

"Ibid., pp. 130, 131. 

•U. S. Bu. of Educ, Contr. to Amer. Ed. Hist., No. 22, p. 137. An excellent account 
of the work of Rev. Eleazar Wheelock in Memoir of Rev. Eleazar Wheelock, D. D., by 
William Allen, American Quarterly Register, Aug., 1837, vol. 10, pp. 2-31. 



RISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIONS. 7 

affiliations or because of religious beliefs.^ Queens College (now 
Eutgers) was founded by the Hollanders — who were adherents of 
the Kef orm faith — with a double purpose, to promote learning and to 
train clergymen for service in the New World.^ 

The period during which these colleges were founded was pro- 
foundly concerned with ecclesiastical questions. The Protestant Eef- 
ormation had but recently swept over northern Europe, arousing 
men's passions and hatreds, but giving to the people the free circula- 
tion of the Scriptures and the right to interpret them. For a century 
the struggle to worship God according to the dictates of conscience 
had been on. It had led to exile from home and from native land, and 
to the founding of the Colonies themselves. It is difficult for people 
of to-day to realize how fully ecclesiastical matters filled the minds of 
our forbears and how profoundly the institutions which they estab- 
lished were influenced thereby. Even the occupations for which the 
young men of the time prepared were chiefly ecclesiastical, as has 
been noted. More than one-half of the graduates of Harvard during 
the seventeenth century entered the ministry, and of the first 33 
graduates of Yale 25 became preachers.^ An examination of the 
names of those who are listed as students in the Boston Latin School 
between the years 1635 and 1734 will show that, of those whose life 
occupation is mentioned, one-half belonged to the clergy. 

It came about naturally, therefore, that religious instruction was 
the main aim of the colonial college, and that, since Latin and Greek 
were among the " holy tongues," especially enabling the pupil to get 
a closer acquaintance with the Bible, the classics were the chief aids 
to the attainment of this end. Luther expressed the esteem in which 
Latin and Greek were generally held when he said : 

For a time no one understood why God had revived the study of the lan- 
guages (Latin and Greek) ; but now we see that it was for the sake of the 
Gospel, which He wished to bring to light and thereby expose and destroy the 
reign of antichrist.* 

While 24 colleges were founded prior to 1800,^ the most remarkable 
growth of the institutions of higher learning came in the nineteenth 
century. At the beginning of that century not more than 100 pro- 
fessors and instructors or more than 2,000 students were to be found 
in all the colleges then existing, and $1,000,000 would cover the 
aggregate value of college property. A century later (1902) there 
were 638 institutions of higher learning, with a faculty of more than 
18,000 men and women and a student body exceeding 100,000. Fur- 
thermore, the combined property value of the colleges had increased 

1 U. S. Bu. of Educ, Contr. to Amer. Ed. Hist, No. 22, p. 141. 

2 Thwing, A Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., p. 136. 

2 Thwing, The American College in American Life, p. 3. 

* Luther, Letters to the Mayors and Aldermen of all the Cities of Germany, 

E For table see Boone, Educ. in U. S., p. 77, 



8 KEORQAlSriZATION' OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

during this 100 years from $1,000,000 to over $230,000,000, with 
productive funds besides amounting to $186,000,000.^ 

This pronounced interest of the nineteenth century in higher edu- 
cation, though due to the expanding activities of the people and of 
the several fields of knowledge, was greatly stimulated by two pro- 
visions which the National Government made for the founding 
and support of higher education. The Ordinance of 1787 provided 
that two complete townships in each State formed from the public 
domain might be set apart for university purposes. Under the opera- 
tion of this act every State admitted into the Union since the year 
1800, with the exception of Maine, Texas, and West Virginia, has 
received not less than two townships for the purpose of founding a 
university. The grants for institutions of higher learning, under 
this law, have aggregated more than a million acres.^ 

The second provision by which the National Government en- 
couraged the founding of such institutions was that called the Morrill 
Act, passed by Congress in 1862. This act provided for a grant of 
80,000 acres of land for each Eepresentative and Senator in Congress. 
The grant conveyed in all 9,600,000 acres, and the amount raised 
from the sale of this land, varying in different States from $50,000 
to $750,000, was to be applied to institutions at which technical and 
agricultural branches should be taught. As a result, within 20 years, 
every State in the Union had established such a school, either in con- 
nection with an existing college or as a new institution.^ Besides 
these grants. Congress gave to the several States (1850) certain 
swamp lands, aggregating nearly 48,000,000 acres. Some States — 
California for instance — appropriated their share to the university ; 
others turned the proceeds into their general school fund.* In con- 
sequence of the Federal aid so generously given, colleges and univer- 
sities multiplied with unprecedented rapidity. So rapidly, indeed, 
were they founded, that in a single century — 

while the population of the country increased 6 times, the number of such 
institutions increased 20 times, the number of instructors 170 times, the number 
of students 47 times, and the property and productive funds 200 times.* 

This awakening of interest in higher education, which began to be 
felt in the first decades of the nineteenth century, was accompanied by 
a significant enlargement of the courses of study offered in the col- 
leges and universities, and, down to the present time, this develop- 
ment has been constant, though slow. For almost 200 years after 

1 See Rep. of U. S. Commis. of Ed., 1902, Vol. II. 

2 Thwing, A Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., p. 189. 

3 Dexter, Hist, of Ed. in U. 8., pp. 282, 283. 

* Button and Snedden, Administration of Pub. Ed. in U. 8., p. 32. 
» Dexter, Hist, of Ed. in U. 8., p. 269. 



EISB OF THE CHIEF DIVISIOlSrS. 9 

the founding of Harvard College, its course of study, except in 
minor details, remained unchanged. Philosophy, including physics, 
logic, ethics, and politics, occupied one-third of the time; Greek, 
with special attention to the study of the New Testament, was second 
in importance ; rhetoric was third, with much time given to " dispu- 
tations " and debates upon philosophical subjects ; oriental languages 
came next, including the study of Hebrew, Chaldee, and Syriac; 
mathematics occupied but a small place, and, down to the middle of 
the eighteenth century, was of the most elementary character.^ These 
subjects, with the catechism and a little botany, comprised the typical 
course of the colonial college that every student was compelled to 
pursue for the prescribed collegiate period without regard to vo- 
cational plans.^ 

The first important addition to the subjects studied was that of 
chemistry, which came in response to the rapid discoveries made in 
this branch of science. Though first introduced in the medical school 
of the University of Pennsylvania in 1768 as a part of the instruction 
given in materia medica, its claim to a place in college curricula was 
not generally recognized until well toward the middle of the nine- 
teenth century. From the beginning, the study of history had formed 
a small part of the course of study, but had been associated with 
classical or theological subjects. The first chair of history was es- 
tablished at William and Mary in 1822; the second came 17 years 
later at Harvard. It was not until 1865 that Yale created such a 
professorship. The study of economics as a differentiated subject 
began at Harvard in 1820, and was rapidly taken up by other colleges 
of the time, in quick response to the commercial and industrial ac- 
tivity of the period. The study of modern languages, inaugurated 
by Bowdoin in 1825, came slowly into general recognition. 

As the studies offered increased in number and as college enroll- 
ments grew, two important changes in organization were necessitated : 
Departmental instruction and election of studies. In the early years 
of the American college one instructor taught a given class in all 
subjects, but by 1766 the attendance had increased at Harvard to 
such a degree as to compel a change to the present plan of teaching 
by subjects. When the number of subjects offered increased beyond 
what a single student could carry, the problem of selection arose. The 
first step toward meeting this difficulty was taken by William and 
Mary in 1779, but the first institution which was frankly founded on 
the principle of free electives was the University of Virginia (1825). 
This institution, the " child of Thomas Jefferson," was the embodi- 
ment of his ideas on higher education. In its elective system it ex- 

1 See discussion, Thwing, A Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., pp. 25-32. 
« Dexter, Hist, of Ed. in V. 8., pp. 285, 289. 



10 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

emplified its founder's thought as expressed in a letter of his to 
George Ticknor : 

I am not fully informed of the practices at Harvard, but there is one from 
which we shall certainly vary, although it has been copied, I believe, by nearly 
every college and academy in the United States. That Is, the holding of the 
students all to one prescribed course of reading, and disallowing the exclusive 
application to those branches only which are to qualify them for the particular 
vocations to which they are destined. We shall, on the contrary, allow them 
imcontrolled choice in the lectures they choose to attend, and require elementary 
qualification only and sufficient age. Our institution will proceed on the prin- 
ciple of doing all the good it can, without consulting its own pride or ambition ; 
of letting every one come and listen to whatever he thinks may improve his 
condition of mind.^ 

Though profound changes in the organization of the colleges and 
in the courses of study offered by them were effected before the Civil 
War, yet during the 50 years which have since elapsed a greater in- 
ternal development has taken place than during the entire history of 
the college prior to that struggle. Indeed, the last three or four dec- 
ades comprise a time of unparalleled educational activity in every 
field. New subjects have been given places in college curricula, 
and old subjects have been broken up into many parts; entrance re- 
quirements have been revamped and new plans for matriculation have 
been devised ; new educational conceptions have forced their way into 
the foreground and have shifted emphasis and alignment; questions 
of free electives, or group electives, or no electives, with attendant 
efforts to apply in practice the opinion held, have broken up the 
traditional arrangements; the demand for preparation for profes- 
sional and industrial vocations, in contrast with the older demand for 
general culture, has forced recognition. These among many other 
questions have aroused an interest and commanded an attention in 
these later years without parallel. 

Under the influence of college and university, a host of schools 
that are directly preparatory in purpose have grown up. In conse- 
quence, the content of the work of such schools has been shaped by 
the college ideal. As the college changed, so the school changed. As 
the college took on more work, it raised its admission standards and 
crowded more of its work back into the preparatory school. At the 
other end of the ladder stands the elementary school, at first satisfied 
merely with securing but a small degree of literacy, but becoming 
more ambitious and effective as time passed. Expanding loiowledge 
and enlarging occupations and more generous support developed the 
elementary school. As it grew in efficiency a desire developed for a 
schooling that should be more advanced and yet not necessarily pre- 

1 For a general discussion of the foregoing matters relating to the course of study, also 
for the above extract from Jefferson's letters, see Thwing, A Hist, of Higher Ed. in Amer., 
ch. 13. Jefferson's letter is in Adams's Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia, 
pp. 123, 124. 



RISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIONS, 11 

paratory to college. The fact that the institution of higher learning 
sought a means of preparing its prospective students, while the ele- 
mentary school was seeking to broaden its work produced two oppos- 
ing tendencies. The conflict that has resulted within the field of 
secondary education has been sharp and long continued, but out of 
it has come a distinctively American institution, the free public high 
school. 

The secondary schools of the Colonies, the so-called grammar 
schools, closely resembled the Latin schools of England, after which 
for the most part they were modeled. They were religious in char- 
acter and distinctly classical in content. They were founded pri- 
marily to fit the youth of the time for college — Harvard and Yale 
in the North and William and Mary in the South. The training 
given was such as would meet the demands of the colleges. 

The requirements for admission to Harvard, first formulated near 
the middle of the seventeenth century, are typical of the eollege de- 
mands of this early period : 

When any scholar is able to read Tully or any like classical Latin author, 
ex tempore, and make and speak true Latin in verse and prose (suo ut aiunt 
Marte), and decline perfectly the paradigms of names and verbs in the Greek 
tongue, these may be admitted to the college; nor shall any claim admission 
before such qualification.^ 

As already noted, the times in which the Colonists lived were 
profoundly affected by religious questions. The "holy tongues" 
(Latin and Greek) were thought to have peculiar value in religious 
training. In consequence, the content and subject matter of the 
colonial grammar schools were little more than a prolonged drill in 
Latin grammar, supplemented by some attention to Greek ; a detailed 
grammatical and rhetorical study of selected Latin texts, such as 
Cicero, Ovid, Terence, and Virgil ; and the daily reading in Latin of 
portions of the Bible, of catechisms, and of creeds, and, in the upper 
classes, of New Testament epistles in Greek. Thus these schools 
remained, until well toward the Kevolution, college preparatory in 
specific purpose, narrowly classical in the content of instruction, 
permeated by the pietistic spirit of the times, and adapted to the 
needs of a small part of the community only. 

While the dominant educational thought of the Colonists took 
form in the college and its preparatory schools, there was a growing 
undercurrent of dissatisfaction with both their content and purpose, 

A broad view of the complex educational activities of the Renais- 
sance period will show that each is related to one or to the other of 
two antagonistic tendencies. On the one hand, there was the tend- 
ency to fix the " Golden age " in the past, among the ancient Greeks 

1 :Ne'W England First Fruits, in Old South Leaflets, No. 51, p. 2, 
5930°— 16 2 



12 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

and Romans. This Avorship of the past led to a wider and more in- 
tensive study of the Latin and Greek Languages ; to a devotion to the 
classic literature of both languages; to a search for the manuscript 
remains of this literature, to a passion for collecting them; and, 
finally, through the discovery of printing, for their general dissemi- 
nation.i The immediate effect of this devotion to the study of 
classical literature was the introduction into the schools of a new 
and enriching content, one which stood in strong contrast with the 
abstract, metaphysical, and unreal content of the scholastic educa- 
tion of the Middle Ages. It was not long, however, before the edu- 
cational effort of the time shifted from content to that of the mastery 
of form alone. This conception of education placed little value on 
preparation for social activity; it provided no place for the study 
of nature or of history; it ignored almost completely the physical 
training of the youth; it gave no consideration to the world, its 
people, and their problems ; in short, the dominant educational prac- 
tice of the sixteenth century had degenerated to a condition little 
less formal and profitless than the narrow scholastic type of the 
fourteenth.^ 

The tendencies antagonistic to this narrow classical education like- 
wise had their beginnings in the period of the Renaissance. Eras- 
mus, Rabelais, John Milton, Montaigne, Mulcaster, Comenius, and 
other great educational lights of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seven- 
teenth centuries were the speakers for the opposition. These men 
were a unit in criticism of the narrow, formal, linguistic teaching of 
the time. They all respected the classics, and as a means to an end 
each of these men in a measure grasped the modern conception that 
education should be a training for social service in church, state, city, 
and family, and that this need must affect the content of education. 

Erasmus, in his System of Studies, wrote : 

Knowledge seems to be of two kinds — that of things and that of words. That 
of words comes first, and that of things is the more Important. 

Rabelais, though advocating the study of languages — Greek, Latin, 
Hebrew, and even Chaldee and Arabic, violently condemned the old 
linguistic and formal education. Wliile he believed that almost the 
whole of education was to be gained through books, he would have 
their content mastered because of its bearing on other problems of 
practical life.^ The famous Tractate on Education, wherein Milton 
" sets down in writing that voluntary idea, which hath long in silence 
presented itself to me, of a better education, in extent and comprehen- 
sion far more large, and yet of time far shorter, and of attainment 
far more certain, than hath been yet in practice," arraigned the edu- 

1 Monroe, The Hist, of Ed., p. 354. ^ Ibid., ch. 6. » Ibid., p. 447. 



EISE OP THE CHIEF DIVISIONS. 13 

cation of the times, and in addition expressed his own conception, 
which is summarized in the notable definition of education which he 
formulated : 

I call therefore a complete and generous education that which fits a man to 
perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously all the ofiices, both private and 
public, of peace and war. 

Montaigne had much to say in criticism of the " custom of peda- 
gogues to be eternally thundering in their pupils' ears, as if they were 
pouring into a funnel, while the business of the pupil is only to repeat 
what the others have said." 

Mulcaster bemoaned the " imperfection at this day [of elementary 
instruction] , so that we can hardly do any good, the groundwork of 
their entry being so rotten underneath."^ Finally, the position of 
Comenius is briefly indicated by the following passage in The Great 
Didactic : 

I call a school that fulfills its functions perfectly one which is a true forging 
place of man — in a word, where nil men are taught all things thoroughly. 

Though this slowly evolving conception, due primarily to the 
growing stores of knowledge and the expanding activities of the 
times, that education must take into account the needs which life im- 
poses, was the chief source of dissatisfaction with existing conditions, 
the prevailing use of classical authors to provide the content of 
instruction was attacked on an ecclesiastical ground, namely, the 
belief that, inasmuch as such authors were non- Christian, their 
teachings and that of the Bible were in conflict. This view, which 
was Puritan in its inception, was forcibly expressed by William Dell, 
master of a college in the time of Cromwell. He said : 

My counsel is that they [children] learn the Greek and Latin tongues espe- 
cially from Christians, and so without the lies, fables, follies, vanities, whore- 
doms, lust, pride, revenge, etc., of the heathens, especially seeing neither their 
words nor their phrases are meet for Christians to take in their mouth. ^ 

This view never became dominant even among the Puritans, the 
majority of whom held firmly to the position that the classics were 
helpful in religious instruction, which to them was the chief aim of 
education. 

While these insurgent views of the Old World found zealous 
exponents among the American colonists, the narrow humfanistic 
conception of education was for the time in the ascendancy. Indeed, 
it was under the dominance of this view that Massachusetts Bay 
Colony in 1647 ordered, under penalty of a fine, that whenever any 
town within the colony should increase to the number of 100 families 
a school should be established which would fit the youth for college. 

1 Quoted in Watson, TJie English Grammar School, p. 138. ^ ibid., p. 535. 



14 BEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

The colony, however, failed in enforcing the order to any consider- 
able degree ; for, in addition to the views of distrust which many of 
the Colonists shared with the people of Europe, there were local 
causes at work. The several communities were very poor and could 
ill aiford the expense; the tax for the support of such a school fell 
upon all, whereas only a few could avail themselves of its advantages; 
the competition of the elementary school for maintenance, the rise of 
towns and cities, the increase of trade, the rise of a political life, the 
struggle to conquer the ever-widening frontier, were other factors as 
well. In short, the social, economic, and political conditions under 
which the Colonists lived operated in the same direction, and in con- 
sequence a secondary education which prepared for but a single voca- 
tion became a matter of indifference to an increasing number of 
people, and a general apathy toward the grammar schools resulted. 
An institution more closely adjusted to the changed conditions was 
needed. The academy, which was not long in coming, was the imme- 
diate, though not final, answer to this need. 

The colonial academy, like the colonial grammar school, was of 
English ancestry, and in its inception in both England and America 
it primarily expressed religious dissent. The establishment of the 
academy in England was chiefly an attempt to provide the chil- 
dren of nonconformist clergymen and of other nonconformists with 
an education in free imitation of the university. At first, for obvious 
reasons, these schools were established secretly, but under the Tolera- 
tion Act of 1689 conditions became somewhat easier, so that such 
schools multiplied rapidly, and later became an integral part of the 
English educational scheme. 

It was easy for the founders of these schools to accept and act 
upon the suggestions which were being made by the leaders of the 
time in educational reform. Preparation for ecclesiastical offices in 
nonconformist congregations was a prominent though not an exclusive 
purpose of these schools, and therefore an important place in the 
course of study was given to the classical languages and to the 
Scriptures. To the study of these, however, many subjects were 
added which were excluded from the grammar schools of the time. 
These newer subjects gi^adually came to be taught in the mother 
tongue, the study of which was emphasized in all these schools. Inas- 
much as the nonconformist children were denied the university, these 
academies were designated as finishing schools, in consequence of 
which we find them extending their curriculum beyond the grammar 
schools and including the elements of some of the subjects taught 
in the universities, and also attempting to incorporate in their courses 
studies that had a closer relation to the practical duties of life than 
those traditionally pursued. The departure from the grammar 



RISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIONS. 15 

schools of the time is best shown by an enumeration of the subjects 
treated, varying with the school. These included French, Italian, 
Hebrew, logic, rhetoric, ethics, metaphysics, history, economics, ora- 
tory, theology, natural philosophy, anatomy, geography, geometry, 
algebra, surveying, trigonometry, conic sections, celestial mechanics, 
and even shorthand.^ 

In so far as the academy in England was the result of forces other 
than religious dissent, it had its counterpart in the Real Schools 
{Realschulen) of Germany. There the rise of cities, the growth of 
trade, the development of technical sciences, and the rapid expansion 
of the industrial world created a demand for a course of instruction 
suited to these modern needs which the Real Schools sought to 
supply.^ 

Though a school called an " academy " was founded in Pennsyl- 
vania in 1726, the first American school really expressing this new 
spirit was established at Philadelphia in 1751, through the efforts 
of Benjamin Franklin. Franklin's idea, expressed in his Proposals 
Relating to the Education of Youth in Pennsylvania^ was widely 
circulated, and exercised a profound influence, for it helped to give 
to the academy, as developed in America, its distinctive features. 
Concerning the content of instruction, he wrote in his " Proposals " : 

As to their studies, it would be well if they could be taught everything that 
is useful and everything that is ornamental. But art is long and their time 
is short. It is therefore proposed that they learn those things that are likely 
to be most useful and most ornamental, regard being had to the several pro- 
fessions for which they are intended. All interested for divinity should be 
taught the Latin and Greek; for physics, the Latin, Greek, and French; for 
law, the Latin and French; merchants, the French, German, and Spanish; 
and, though all should not be compelled to learn Latin, Greek, or the modern 
foreign languages, yet none that have an ardent desire to learn them should be 
refused; their English, arithmetic, and other studies absolutely necessary, 
being at the same time not neglected.^ 

As originally organized, Franklin's Academy, which eventually 
developed into the University of Pennsylvania, comprised three 
departments — the Latin school, the English school, and the mathe- 
matical school. Later a department of philosophy was added, which, 
together with the Latin school, was called the " college," while the 
name " academy " was retained by the English and mathematical 
departments.* 

By the time the Revolution began a number of schools similar in 
character had been established in the middle and southern Colonies, 
and before the close of the war the founding of an academy in Mas- 

1 Monroe, 'Eist. of Ed., p. 499. 

' See Paulsen, German Education, ch. 2. 

* Sparks, Works of Franklin, Vol. I, pp. 572, 574. 

* Brown, The American High School, p. 18. 



16 EEOBGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

sachusetts (Andover) and one in New Hampshire (Exeter) gave 
fresh impetus to the movement of protest.^ The academy met with 
popular favor, and after the Revolution ended and the country 
became quiet, schools of this kind multiplied with great rapidity 
until the middle of the century, when their influence began to wane. 
Eventually they, in turn, were forced to give way to another type, 
which was better fitted to the changed needs of a rapidly expanding 
people. 

For the American people the first half of the nineteenth century, 
the period of the ascendancy of the academy, was a period of intense 
internal expansion. The population of the country at the beginning 
of the century was confined to the narrow strip lying between the 
Appalachians and the Atlantic seaboard, while the territory stretch- 
ing away to the west was left to the Indians. Fifty years later the 
frontier had been pushed to the Mississippi; the intervening terri- 
tory had been dotted with settlements; many people had gone still 
farther westward, spreading out over the plains facing the Rocky 
Mountains; and a sufficient population had settled on the Pacific 
coast to entitle that district to two States. Within a single half 
century the center of population shifted from a point near Wash- 
ington, D. C, to one near the middle of Ohio. 

This enormous movement of population, with all that such a move- 
ment in a virgin country means — the clearing of forests ; the building 
of homes and villages; the construction of turnpikes, canals, and 
railroads; the development of factories; the creation of banks and 
courts and schools — was a prodigious change to be made within the 
space of one generation.^ The War of 1812 marked the beginning of 
this period of industrial reorganization. With the coming of the final 
struggle with the mother country there came the realization that the 
weak American Nation must shift for itself among the nations of the 
world, and along with the recognition of utter isolation came the 
determination that the needs of the people should be met through 
the development of the resources of their own country. For the 
first time since the founding of the Colonies the people of the United 
* States turned their faces away from Europe — which they had looked 
upon as the source of their civilization and their institutions, as well 
as a market place where they could exchange their raw stuffs for 
manufactured articles — to their own country and its possibilities.^ 
The period of 50 years thereafter, terminating with the Civil War, 
was a time, therefore, when new occupations were opening for the 
young man on every hand ; when new demands were being made on 
his intelligence and his resource; when new problems in law, in 

1 Brown, The Making of Our Middle Schools, ch. 9. 

2 Day, A History of Commerce, ch. 48. 

^ Webster, General History of Commerce, pp. 355-387. 



RISE OF THE CHIEF DIVISIONS. 17 

statesmanship, in business, in the professions, were rapidly rising; 
when everything was in flux and little had taken permanent shape. 

It was during this period of industrial reorganization and eco- 
nomic change that the academy flourished. It was founded as a pro- 
test against the narrow, pedantic training of the Latin grammar 
school. It was seized upon by the American people in the hope that 
it would provide a way for securing that kind of training which 
the problems of the New World demanded. So rapidly did these 
schools grow that by 1850 there were more than 6,000 such institu- 
tions in the United States, with an enrollment of 263,000 pupils and 
comprising a teaching force of more than ISjOOO.'^ 

Though the academy was founded partly in protest against the 
narrow, classical training of the early schools, and, though it was 
looked upon originally as a " finishing " school with the twofold ob- 
ject of providing a general culture and a preparation for life, yet, 
because it was a private institution under private control, and be- 
cause it relied, in part, on tuition fees for its support, attendance was 
restricted to the children of those parents who were fairly pros- 
perous.^ This tendency toward exclusiveness was not in accord with 
the growing spirit of democracy, as evidenced by the fact that very 
early in the period of the academy there can be detected a demand, 
which became increasingly insistent, that the opportunity for an edu- 
cation beyond that afforded by the elementary school should be 
denied no one because of poverty. In consequence, even in the first 
days of the academy, not infrequently some financial assistance was 
rendered by city and State. Still later, in response to this demand, 
in not a few cases, the academy was taken over by the city or town 
and maintained by taxation. But, in general, the problem of carry- 
ing at public expense a pupil who did not wish a college course 
beyond the elementary school was solved by the creation of a dis- 
tinctively American institution — the free public high school. 

The first of these schools was founded at Boston in 1821, but up to 
the middle of the century their growth was very slow, due largely 
to the fact that the theory that the State is responsible for supplying 
at public expense an education for all had been generally accepted 
for elementary education alone. By 1850, however, the demand for 
schools which were higher in grade than the elementary schools, and 
which should be accessible to the poor as well as to the rich, had 
grown into an irresistible movement. In consequence of this demand 
there is now scarcely a town in the United States of any considerable 
size in which a public high school, comprising a three or four years' 

1 Table showing status of the academy of 1859, in Dexter, A Hist, of Ed. in U. S., p. 96. 
* See Brown, The American High School, p. 21. 



18 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

course, is not to be found, and, indeed, many rural communities are 
quite as fortunate. 

As originally planned, the high school sought to serve only those 
who did not want to go to college,^ but it was not long before these 
schools introduced a college preparatory course. Thus, by a process 
of natural development, the high school took over the fimctions 
originally performed by both the Latin grammar school and the 
academy — that is, preparation for college and preparation for life. 
With the advent of the State university and the conception of a com- 
plete State-supported, State-controlled educational system, and with 
the rapidly growing demand of recent years for higher education, 
this work of preparation for college has become one of far-reaching 
importance. In thus adding to its original function of a " finish- 
ing " school that of fitting for college, the high school has become, by 
process of growth, the connecting link between the elementary school 
and the college. The free public high school alone covild serve the rich 
and the poor, those who prepared for college as well as those who did 
not, and, in so doing, it stands as one of the few distinctly Ameri- 
can products. 

As originally established, the high school sought only to extend 
the education given in the district school. The popular conception 
of the function of the high school held during the first half century 
of its growth is expressed by Henry Barnard in his fourth annual 
report to the Connecticut Legislature (1842). After describing the 
low state of education in Connecticut he offers numerous remedies, 
among them being the establishment of primary, intermediate, and 
■ high schools. In discussing the latter, he says : 

This school should receive such pupils as are found qualified in the studies 
of the secondary (intermediate) schools, on due examination, and conduct them 
forward in algebra, geometry, surveying, natural, moral, and mental philosophy, 
political economy, the history and Constitution of Connecticut and the United 
States, booklvceping, comix)sition, and drawing with reference to its use in 
various liinds of business. Whatever may be the particular studies, this school 
should afford a higher elementary education than is now given in the district 
school, and, at the same time, furnish an education preparatory to the pursuits 
of commerce, trade, manufactures, and the mechanical arts. All that is now 
done in this way for the children of the rich and educated should be done for 
the whole community, so that the poorest parent who has worthy and talented 
children may see the way open for them to a thorough and practical education.* 

1 See Brown, The Making of Our Middle Schools, p. 295. 

2 See detailed review of Henry Barnard's Fourth Annual Report (1842), in Am. Jour. 
Ed. (1856), Vol. I, p. 703. 



Chapter II. 

THE RISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 



Contents. — The beginning — German influence on foreign systems — German influence on 
American systems — Adams's letters on German schools — Action of the Free School 
Society of New York — Charles Brooks and the Prussian system — John D. Pierce and 
the report of Cousin — A. D. Bache's report — Calvin Stowe's report — Henry Barnard's 
influence — Dr. Stephen Olin's journals — Horace Mann's visit to Germany — John D. 
Philbrick — Joseph Kay's publication — Graduate students in Germany — Debt of Amer- 
ican educational pioneers to Germany ; compulsory school attendance ; training 
teachers ; system of supervision ; reasonable salaries ; personnel of school commit- 
tee — The grading of schools; early steps; Quincy School (Boston); in primary 
schools ; variation in divisions ; struggle to secure ; union schools ; progress by 1870 ; 
length of periods ; grouping taken from Prussia ; duration of elementary period 
traced to early church practices ; Hall's view of signiflcance of church rites ; four- 
teen attractive, as being twice the sacred number seven. 



The practice of segregating children of the same age and of the 
same attainments into " grades " or " years " and grouping together 
the first eight to form the elementary division had its beginning with 
us in the third and fourth decades of the nineteenth century. In its 
essential features the plan was borrowed from Germany, where, at 
the time of its introduction into America, it was rapidly becoming 
the universal plan of school organization, and where it had been 
evolved during three centuries of educational discussion and practice. 

So well organized had the school system of Germany become 
that in every civilized country educators who were seeking light 
were turning with critical interest to an examination of its details. 
France sent (1831) M. Victor Cousin, one of the most profound and 
gifted writers of the time, to make a study of the German system. 
He pronounced the school law of Prussia "the most comprehensive 
and perfect legislative measure regarding primary instruction " with 
which he was acquainted.^ In 1850 Italy sent a commission to study 
the schools of the principal States of Europe, which prepared a 
voluminous report on the state of public instruction in Germany, 
with particular reference to the improvement of the public schools 

^ For copious extracts from Cousin, Report on the Condition of Public Instruction in 
Germany, Particularly in Prussia, see Am. Jour. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 231-236; 
237-244. Footnote, Cochrane's Foreign Quarterly, Vol. I, No. 2, p. 269, says the English 
translation of the above was republished in New York, and " The committee of the legis- 
lature has recommended its distribution to all the towns." This book was read by John 
D. Pierce before he planned the Michigan school system (1836). 

19 



20 EEOKGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

of every grade in Italy. This report led to a revision of the school 
laws of the latter country, whereby primary schools of a higher and 
lower grade, secondary schools, including classical and technical 
schools, and a new organization of the universities were instituted.^ 
In 1774 Austria appointed the Augustine monk, Felbiger, director 
of the normal schools in all the Austrian dominions. Felbiger, after 
spending several years at Berlin, to obtain an intimate knowledge 
of the methods of instruction practiced there, opened a school in 
Silesia (then belonging to Prussia) for the training of teachers. His 
work in Silesia was so noticeable that it led to the Austrian appoint- 
ment, and, with it, to the partial reorganization of the common 
schools of that country.^ The influence of Germany on the Austrian 
school system was again felt, when, in 1805, was published the 
Constitution of the German Common Schools, which to this day is 
the basis in large part of the school law of Austria.^ England, too, 
recognizing the supremacy of the German system of the period, dis- 
patched from time to time Government commissioners to Germany, 
who, in turn, submitted to Parliament elaborate reports on the 
German plan of organization. 

In America, during the period when our schools were being molded 
into the semblance of a system, German influence in shaping the 
structure was much more direct and potent than has been generally 
recognized. 

John Quincy Adams, in a series of letters, published in Philadel- 
phia in 1803, describing the educational system of Silesia, which he 
had been examining, said : 

The arrangements and regulations of the trivial schools, as they are here 
called — schools destined for that elementary instruction which ought to be dif- 
fused over the whole mass of the people — particularly deserve your attention, 
because you may, perhaps, as a native of New England, entertain the prejudice 
that your own country is the only spot on earth where this object is rightly 
managed and where the arts of reading and writing are accomplishments almost 
universally possessed. Probably no country in Europe could so strongly contest 
our preeminence in this respect as Germany, and she, for this honorable distinc- 
tion, is indebted principally to Frederick II.* 

In 1821 a committee of the " Free School Society of the City of 
New York," which took the initiative in organizing the first schools 
of that city not supported by denominations, was instructed to cor- 

1 See Puhlic Instruction in the Kingdom of Italy, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 
146-147; also. Public Instruction in Sardinia, by Botta, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1857), vol. 3, 
pp. 513-530. 

* See John Quincy Adams, Educational Reform in Silesia iy Frederick II, in Am. Jour. 
Ed. (1867-68), vol. 17, pp. 126-127 ; also Public Instruction in Austria, in Am. Jour. Ed. 
(1866), vol. 16, p. 9. 

^ See Public Instructions in Austria, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1866), vol. 16, p. 15 (article 
gives a summary). 

* For Adams's letter on Educational Reform in Silesia by Frederick II, in full, see Am. 
Jour. Ed. (1867-68), vol. 17, pp. 125-128. 



EISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. ^1 

respond with distinguished educators in Europe and in the United 
States, to procure information respecting schools.^ 

Charles Brooks, a man whose influence in Massachusetts was great, 
and who may be said to have prepared the way for the work of 
Horace Mann, did very much to disseminate knowledge respecting 
the Prussian system. He was primarily interested in establishing a 
normal school after the Prussian model, yet, during the campaign 
which he carried on for this purpose between the years 1835 
and 1838 he did not limit himself to the consideration of the normal 
school alone, but sought to acquaint the people with the details of the 
German system of elementar}^ education as well. His account of the 
return trip from England, which he made in company with Dr. H. 
Julius, of Hamburg, then on his way to America to study our schools, 
indicates the esteem in which he held the Prussian system : 

A passage of 41 days from Liverpool to New York (witli Dr. Julius) gave 
me time to ask all manner of questions concerning tlie noble, philosophical, 
and practical system of Prussian elementary education. He explained it like 
a sound scholar and a pious Christian. If you will allow the phrase, I fell 
in love with the Prussian system, and it seemed to possess me like a missionary 
angel. * * * 

When the doctor came to visit me at Hingham I told him I had been studying 
the Prussian system for six months, and that I felt called of God to try and 
introduce it into my native State. He rose from his seat, seized my hands, 
after the Hamburg custom, and said : " My friend, you are right ; and I will 
help you all I can." He consented to give an account of the Prussian system, 
before the committee on education in our legislature. His delineations were 
clear and judicious, but so brief as led to no action. 

I opened communication with M. Victor Cousin, the first scholar in Paris, 
with whom I had become acquainted in 1833. He approved most heartily of 
my plans, and sent me his histories of the Prussian, Hollandaise, and Bavarian 
systems of education, and especially normal schools. * * * 

I studied his books thoroughly, and though I preferred the Holland system 
of governmental supervision, I concluded to take the Prussian system of State 
normal schools as my model and guide, and began my public lectures on the 
whole system in 1835. 

Much depended on a right beginning. I knew that the common people would 
be more moved by one practical fact than by a bushel of metaphysics. I there- 
fore wrote three enormously long lectures — namely, two hours each. In the 
first I described minutely the Prussian State system, its studies, books, classifi- 
cation, modes of teaching, government, rewards, punishments, etc. ; a perfect 
catalogue of interesting facts. In my second I showed how this new system 
could be adopted in Massachusetts, and how it would affect every town, every 
school, and especially every family in the State; yes, I took it in my hands 
and carried it from house to house, showing the parents how it would benefit 
their son John and their daughter Mary. In my third I showed that all these 
great, practical Christian results could be realized by establishing State nor- 
mal schools, and could not be realized without them; and therefore the pro- 
posed school reform must begin with introducing such normal schools. 

^ Subjects and Courses of Public Instruction in Cities, in Special Keport of the Commis- 
sioner of Education (1870), in Am. Jour. Ed., vol. 19, p. 509. 



22 EEORGANIZATION OP THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

In his first public lecture on the establishment of the normal school 
Mr. Brooks made the" following statement, which is in point: " From 
what I have learned, it is now my opinion that the Prussian system 
is to make a new era in the public elementary education of the United 
States.'''' And, again, in a review of the History of the Introduction 
of State Normal Schools in America (1864), Mr. Brooks concluded 
by saying: 

The Prussian system, with its two central powers, a board of education, and 
normal schools, was not linown in New England when I first described it, in 
public, in 1835 ; but on the 19th of April, 1838, Massachusetts, the banner State, 
adopted State normal schools by statute. Remembering well how the good 
leaven spread in 1835-1838, I say it was the Prussian system which wrought out 
the educational regeneration of New England.^ 

Just at the time that Charles Brooks was laboring so diligently to 
incorporate in the Massachusetts system the results of Prussian expe- 
rience, another man, John D. Pierce, in Michigan, also an enthusi- 
astic believer in the preeminence of the Prussian organization, was 
laying the foundation for an educational system in his own State 
and building into it the best features of Prussian practice. It was 
mainly because of his suggestions to the chairman of the committee 
on education in the convention that framed the State government in 

1835 that the article in the constitution respecting education was 
framed and provision made for the office of superintendent of public 
instruction. Mr. Pierce was appointed to the superintendency in 

1836 and at once began the work of preparing a plan for a complete 
school system. 

Before framing his recommendations, which were submitted in 

1837 and which were approved for the most part, he visited the 
schools of New England, New York, and New Jersey. Prior to this, 
however, he had learned of the Prussian system through an English 
translation of Cousin's report. This report of Cousin's was first 
made known to the English-speaking people by Sir William Hamil- 
ton, who, in the Edinburgh Review, July, 1833, commended the 
report highly and quoted at considerable length therefrom. The 
next year (1834) that part of the report which treated of Prussian 
practice was translated into English by Mrs. Sarah Austin and ap- 
peared in London. A New York edition of the same translation was 
issued in 1835 and widely distributed.^ It was a copy of this edi- 
tion which, falling into Mr. Pierce's hands, profoundly influenced 
him in framing the system he later submitted to the Michigan 

1 For the foregoing extracts, and for his discussion in full, see Charles Brooks, " His- 
tory of the Introduction of State Normal Schools in America." A pamphlet, printed 1864 
(Boston), in Pamphlets on Education (U. C). vol. 4, No. 4. Extracts given in Albree, 
"Charles Brooks and His Work for Normal Schools" (Medford, 1907). 

2 Stowe, The Prussian System of PuMic Instruction and Its Applicability to the United 
States (Cincinnati edition, 1836) ; preface. 



EISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 23 

Legislature.^ In describing his entrance into public life Mr. Pierce 
speaks of this circumstance : 

About this time (1835) Cousin's report of ttie Prussian system, made to the 
French minister of public instruction, came into my hands and it was read with 
much interest. Sitting one pleasant afternoon upon a log on the hill north of 
where the courthouse at Marshall now stands, Gen. Crary (chairman of the 
convention committee on education) and myself discussed for a long time the 
fundamental principles which were deemed important for the convention to 
adopt in laying the foundations of our State. The subject of education was a 
theme of special interest. It was agreed, if possible, that it should make a 
distinct branch of the government, and that the constitution ought to provide 
for an officer who should have this whole matter in charge and thus keep its 
importance perpetually before the public mind.^ 

Mr. Pierce's indebtedness to Prussia for many of the ideas which 
he worked out in the system which he organized is thus set forth by 
a later superintendent of the Michigan system, Francis W. Shear- 
man, who, writing in 1852, said : 

The system of public instruction which was intended to be established by the 
framers of the constitution (Michigan), the conception of the office, its province, 
its powers, and duties were derived from Prussia. That system consisted of 
three degrees : Primary instruction, corresponding to our district schools ; 
secondary instruction, communicated in schools called Gymnasia; and the high- 
est instruction communicated in the universities. The superintendence of this 
entire system (Prussia), which was formed in 1819, was entrusted to a minister 
of state, called the minister of public instruction, and. embraced everything 
which belonged to the moral and intellectual advancement of the people.^ 

In the same year in which Mr. Pierce was made superintendent of 
public instruction in Michigan (1836), the trustees of Girard College, 
Philadelphia, commissioned its president, A. D. Bache, "to visit all 
establishments in Europe resembling Girard College, or any others 
which promise to afford useful information in organizing it," and to 
prepare a report covering his observations. After two years spent 
in a careful examination of the schools of Great Britain and Europe, 
he submitted a voluminous report (1839). Those who were inter- 
ested in such matters found in this report a wealth of detail re- 
lating to the educational practices of Great Britain, France, Switzer- 
land, Italy, Holland, Belgium, and Germany. Respecting the system 
of Germany, and particularly that of Prussia, he wrote : 

Prussia is at present decidedly in advance of the other larger German States 
in the education of the people, especially in the manner and matter of instruc- 
tion. As the various accounts which have been given of public instruction in 
Prussia have, in general, referred to the system more particularly than to the 
schools, I shall in this report touch more briefly upon the former and go more 

1 Hoyt aBd Ford, John D. Pierce, Founder of the Michigan School System, p. 19. 

^Michigan Pioneer Collections, vol. 1, p. 38. 

8 Shearman, Public Instruction and School Law of Michigan (1852), pp. 18, 19. 



24 EEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

into detail in regard to the latter. By reference to tlieir spirit and minute 
arrangements it is easy to see wliere they would apply as perfectly in a repub- 
lic as in a monarchy/ 

In the same year (183G) the General Assembly of Ohio requested 
Calvin E. Stowe, i^rofessor of biblical literature, Lane Seminary, 
Cincinnati, who was about to visit Europe, to formulate a report 
upon the educational systems of the countries through which he 
might pass, and to present it to the general assembly. In accordance 
with this request his observations were laid before the thirty-sixth 
general assembly (1837), which ordered the report published and a 
copy sent to every school district in the State. In addition, the re- 
port was republished and extensively circulated by the Legislatures 
of Michigan, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsyl- 
vania. The legislature of the last-named State alone printed and 
distributed 5,000 copies in the English language and 2,000 in Ger- 
man.^ In this report, entitled " Report on Elementary Public In- 
struction in Europe," particular attention was given to a descrip- 
tion of the primary schools of Germany, especially to those of 
Prussia and Wurttemberg. It is interesting to note that at the time 
when Horace Mann and Henry Barnard were taking up their work 
of arousing the American people from their indiiference toward the 
common school this report on the German plan of organization almost 
exactly sketches the American system as it subsequently developed.^ 

Henrj'- Barnard in 1836 also visited Germany and spent several 
months in the examination of schools. As commissioner of educa- 
tion in Rhode Island, and later in Connecticut, and also as United 
States Commissioner of Education, he did more perhaps than any 
other person to make known to the American people the fruits of the 
educational experience of European countries. Through his official 
publications, and particularly through the columns of his educational 
journals, he disseminated the facts pertaining to German practice 
very widely. 

On account of his health Dr. Stephen Olin, later president of Wes- 
leyan University, went to Europe in 1837 and spent three years in 
travel and in the examination of schools and other institutions. His 
journals and letters are filled with comments upon what he saw. 
Relative to the Prussian school system he wrote : 

The Prussian system of education is certainly the most perfect in existence, 
whether the higher, the intermediate, or common grades of learning be con- 
sidered.* 

In 1843 Horace Mann visited the schools of Germany and of other 
European countries. An account of his visit is given in his seventh 

^Bache, Report on Education in Europe (1839), pp. 6, 7. 

s See the Harrisburg edition (1838), p. 4. 

8 This description is quoted, p. 36. 

* The Life and Letters of Stephen Olin, vol. 1, p. 324. 



EISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 25 

annual report to the board of education of Massachusetts (January, 
1844). In this report he commended the organization and grading 
of the German schools in the following words : 

I do not hesitate to say tliat there are many things abroad which we at home 
should do well to imitate — things, some of which are here as yet mere matters 
of speculation and theory, but which, there, have long been in operation and 
are now producing a harvest of rich and abundant blessings. Among the nations 
of Europe Prussia has long enjoyed the most distinguished reputation for the 
excellence of its schools. In reviews, in speeches, in tracts, and even in graver 
works devoted to the cause of education, its schools have been exhibited as 
models for the imitation of the rest of Christendom.^ 

And again he said, under the caption " Classification " : 

The first element of superiority in a Prussian school, and one whose influence 
extends throughout the whole subsequent course of instruction, consists in the 
proper classification of the scholars. In all places where the numbers are 
sufiiciently large to allow it the children are divided according to ages and 
attainments, and a single teacher has the charge only of a single class or of as 
small a number of classes as is practicable. I have before adverted to the con- 
struction of the schoolhouses, by which, as far as possible, a room is assigned 
to each class. Let us suppose a teacher to have the charge of but one class, and 
to have talent and resources sufficient properly to engage and occupy its atten- 
tion, and we suppose a perfect school. But how greatly are the teacher's 
duties Increased and his difficulties multiplied if he have four, five, or half a 
dozen classes under his personal inspection. While attending to the recitation 
of one his mind is constantly called off to attend to the studies and the conduct 
of all the others. For this very few teachers amongst us have the requisite 
capacity, and hence the idleness and the disorder that reign in so many of our 
schools, excepting in cases where the debasing motive of fear puts the children 
in irons. All thfese difficulties are at once avoided by a suitable classification, 
by such a classification as enables the teacher to address his instructions at 
the same time to all the children who are before him, and to accompany them 
to the playground at recess or intermission without leaving any behind who 
might be disposed to take advantage of his absence. All this will become more 
and more obvious as I proceed with a description of exercises. There is no 
obstacle whatever, save prescription, and that vis inertias of mind which con- 
tinues in the beaten track because it has not vigor enough to turn aside from 
it, to the introduction at once of this mode of dividing and classifying scholars 
in all our large towns.^ 

In John D. Philbrick, whose name will always be associated with 
the schools of Boston, of which he was made superintendent in 1856, 
the German schools had another influential champion. In 1847, as 
principal of the Quincy Grammar School of Boston, Philbrick or- 
ganized, after the German model, what was probably the first city 
graded school in America. His reports as superintendent abound in 
references to German practice, and many of the innovations which 

1 Mann, Seventh Annual Report, p. 21 ; also Report for 1843, in Life and Works of 
Horace Mann (Lee & Shepard edition), p. 240. 

2 Mann, Seventh Annual Report, p. 84 ; also Report for 1843, in Life and Works of 
Horace Mann, pp. 302, 303 (Lee & Shepard edition) ; also in Am. Jour. Ed. (1860), vol. 8, 
p. 382. 



26 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

he made in the organization of the Boston schools were undoubtedly 
suggested by the information then current concerning the German 
system. 

In 1850 there was published a book written by Joseph Kay, an 
Englishman, and entitled "The Social Condition and Education of 
the People of England and Europe," which was widely read by school 
people in America. It gave much space to a description of the Prus- 
sian organization; condemned the practice, then common in New 
England, of breaking school districts up into increasingly smaller 
units ; and, by contrast, laid particular emphasis on the German prac- 
tice of uniting districts to secure the conditions necessary to grading 
the children. On this point he wrote : 

Instead of creating a great number of small schools in different parts of the 
town, each containing only one or two classes, in which children of very differ- 
ent ages and very different degrees of proficiency must be necessarily mingled 
and taught together, to the manifest retarding of the progress cf the more 
forward as well as of the more backward, several schools (in Prussian towns) 
are generally combined, so as to fonn one large one, containing five boys' 
classes and five girls' classes. In these classes the teachers are able to classify 
the children in such a manner that one teacher may talie the youngest and most 
deficient, another the more advanced, and so on. In this manner, as each 
teacher has a class of children who have made about the same progress in their 
studies, he is enabled to concentrate his whole energies upon the instruction and 
education of all his scholars at the same time, and for the whole time they 
are in school, instead of being obliged to neglect one part of his class whilst he 
attends to another, which is necessarily the case where children of different 
degrees of proficiency are assembled in one classroom, and which is always nec- 
essarily the cause of considerable noise and confusion, tending to distract the 
attention of both teachers and children.* 

Besides the educational leaders of America who visited Germany 
during the first half of the nineteenth century, a steadily increasing 
nun;iber of American students turned to Germany for all or a part 
of their graduate work. Prior to 1850 the number of such students 
had reached nearly a hundred, and comprised such men as Edward 
Everett, George Ticknor, George Bancroft, and Henry W. Longfel- 
low. These men, returning to positions of influence, many to college 
professorships, helped, more or less directly, in their respective com- 
munities, to create a public sentiment favorable to educational prog- 
ress and to disseminate information concerning German practice. 

Just at the time, therefore, when the American system of edu- 
cation was in the forming, Germany's influence was peculiarly 
potent. Indeed, to such degree was the influence felt that not only 
educational leaders, but educated people as well, came to recognize 

^ See Subjects and Methods of Instruction in Prussia, containing extracts from Kay, 
Rocial Condition and Education of the People in England and Europe, In Am. Jour. E(J, 
(1860), vol. 8. pp. 413-434. 



EISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 27 

that the German schools were the best in the world and that America 
could well afford to profit by Germany's experience. In fact, one 
finds that Henry Barnard, Horace Mann, and the other stalwart 
educational pioneers of the time fought for nothing which had not 
already found a permanent place among the practices of the pro- 
gressive States of Germany. They strove for compulsory school 
attendance; but compulsory school attendance had been provided 
for by law in Saxe Gotha in 1643, in Saxony and Wurttemberg in 
1649, in Hildesheim in 1663, in Calemberg in 1681, in Celle in 1689, 
in Prussia in 17 IT, and in every other German State before the 
beginning of the nineteenth century.^ They saw clearly that school 
conditions could never be greatly improved until the teaching body 
was specially trained for its work ; and so they sought to have normal 
schools and seminaries established for the training of teachers. 
Prussia, however, organized a seminary for teachers in 1735; and 
in the 1738 decree for the regulation of the schools of Berlin it was 
provided that teachers should be regularly examined by properly 
authorized officials before being allowed to teach. By the close of 
the century the principle of the special training of teachers was a 
cardinal provision of the school system of Prussia, and by 1833 
there were in Prussia alone 43 normal schools, with an attendance 
of 2,036 students and an annual output of nearly 800 trained 
teachers.^ 

The American leaders sought also to bring about an efficient sys- 
tem of supervision, one which should touch every locality and every 
school. This, too, had been worked out in Europe long before the 
first State superintendent in America was ever appointed.^ Two 
radically different types of supervision had been evolved — that of 
Prussia, which was highly centralized, allowing considerable latitude 
in individual schools, while all were subject to the central authority, 
and that of Holland, in which the system began with the authorities 
of the smallest school unit and terminated, after progressive degrees 
of representation, in the highest authority of the land.* The Ameri- 
can pioneers insisted, furthermore, that the teacher should be paid 
a reasonable salary, and that the office should be one of dignity and 
honor in the community. This, too, had been provided for by 
Frederick II, who, by ordinance (1765), declared that a school 

1 See History of Primary Education in Germany, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1860), vol. 8, pp. 
;'.48-359 ; also Translator's Preface (Sarah Austin) to Cousin's Report on the State of 
Public Instruction in Prussia (Lond., 1834), p. XII. 

2 Bache, Report on Education in Europe (1839), pp. 222, 229. 

■ ^Ihe first State to establish the oflSce was New York, in 1813, later abolished for a 
time ; Pennsylvania (1833) was the first to establish and continue the oflice without 
break. 

* Bache, Report on Education in Europe (1839), pp. 171, 172. 

.mSO°— 16 3 



28 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

should be kept in every village (Silesia), that a competent subsist- 
ence should be provided for the schoolmaster, and that, as the 
ordinance runs, " the gentry, as well as the common people, must not 
consider or treat the teacher as a servant but as an officer whose duty 
it is to form good tenants for landlords and children for parents." * 
Even in the personnel of the school committee, comprising, as it did, 
in the early period of Massachusetts school history, the clergyman, the 
magistrate, and two citizens of the district, there existed a remark- 
able similarity to a provision in the decree of Elector John George 
(1573) authorizing the appointment of school committees of super- 
intendence, each in charge of the smallest school unit, the parish, and 
consisting of the parish clergyman, the local magistrate, and "two 
notables." ^ 

Perhaps no detail of the great work of school regeneration under 
way in the thirties and forties was urged with more determination 
by the progressives than the need for graded schools. Over and over 
again in the reports and publications of the period occur statements 
condemning the tendency toward dividing the school district into 
progressively smaller units and, on the other hand, commending the 
counterplan of consolidating the same in order to secure the condi- 
tions essential to a graded system. And yet in this particular, as 
well as in the plan of school organization which sul)sequently evolved, 
American leaders of the period found in the practice of Germany 
both a precedent and a model. 

The first step in America toward segregation within a given build- 
ing was that which classified the teachers of grammar schools accord- 
ing to the subjects taught rather than the children upon the basis of 
their ages and attainments. The following arrangement, drawn up 
by a committee of which Samuel Adams was a member and adopted 
by Boston in 1789, will illustrate : 

In Town Meeting, October 16, 1789. 

Voted, That there shall be one writing school at the south part of the town, 
one at the center, and one at the north part ; that in those schools the children 
of both sexes be taught writing, and also arithmetic in the various branches of 
(it) usually taught in the town schools, including vulgar and decimal fractions. 

That there be one reading school at the south part of the town, one at the 
center, and one at the north part ; that in those schools the children of both 
sexes be taught to spell, accent, and read both prose and verse, and also to be 
instructed in English grammar and composition. 

That the children of both sexes be admitted into the reading and writing 
schools at the age of 7 years, having previously received the instruction usual 
at women's schools ; that they be allowed to continue in the reading and writing 
schools until the age of 14. the boys attending the year round, the girls from 

1 Quoted by Bache, Report on Education in Europe (18.39), footnote to p. 224. 
- Ibid., pp. 221, 222, where Bachc points out this similarity. 



RISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 29 

the 20th of April to the 20th of October following; that they attend these 
schools alternately, at such times and subject to such changes as the visiting 
committee, in consultation with the masters, shall approve/ 

By this singular arrangement each grammar school had two de- 
partments, called the reading and writing departments. Each of 
these departments had its own rooms, its own set of studies — the 
program of studies being divided for this purpose, not horizontally 
by grades, but vertically by subjects — and its own master and corps 
of assistants, usually two or three in number. The pupils attended 
each department in turn, changing from one to the other at the end 
of each half-day session.^ 

This " double-headed " organization of grammar schools remained 
until the Quincy School (Boston) was established in 1848. With 
the erection of this school, Philbrick, then principal, changed the 
plan of administration; and, in addition, introduced a new type 
of school architecture, which he thus described : ^ 

1. It was large. Up to this time a grammar school with 400 pupils was 
considered very large. This building had 660 seats in its schoolrooms, exclu- 
sive of the hall. 

2. It contained a separate schoolroom for each teacher, 12 in all, and, of 
course, recitation rooms were not needed. 

3. It contained a hall large enough to seat comfortably all the pupils that 
could be accommodated in its schoolrooms, and even more. 

4. It contained a clothes room attached to each schoolroom. 

5. It contained a separate desk and chair for each pupil, this being probably 
the first grammar schoolhouse, here or elsewhere, so far as I know, into which 
this feature was introduced. 

6. It was four stories high — the first of this height — the hall covering the 
whole of the fourth story. 

All the grammar schoolhouses since built in this city are of this type. 
Modifications and improvements, more or less important, have been from time 
to time introduced, but the type has not changed. 

Before the erection of the Quincy School the typical grammar 
building of Boston was a two-story structure, one story being used 
by the writing department, the other by the reading department. 
Each story contained but one hall or schoolroom, which was gen- 
erally large enough to accommodate about 180 pupils. In each room 
there were usually three teachers, carrying on recitations at the same 
time. The first modification of the type came with the addition of a 
third story, the two upper being used as before, but the lower floor 
being used as a primary school. The next step was that of adding 
two recitation rooms to each of the two large halls or schoolrooms, 

1 Quoted by Barnard, 8'u'bjects and Courses of Instruction in Cities, in Am. Jour. Ed. 
(1870), vol. 19, p. 475; also in a pamphlet in the Boston Public Librars", The System of 
PuMic Education Adopted by the Town of Boston, issued by the school committee of 
Boston. 

2 Philbrick, Twenty-ninth Semiannual Report (Sept., 1874), pp. 10-12. 
sibid., pp. 106-107. 



30 KEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

thereby avoiding the confusion due to having the three teachers in 
one room. This was the point reached in the development of the city- 
graded system when the establishment of the Quincy School virtually 
inaugurated the modern scheme of organization, as well as the mod- 
ern tA^pe of building.^ 

The arrangement of this building enabled Mr. Philbrick to work 
out the details of what, in its essential features, is now the typical 
plan of organization for city schools of elementary grade (grammar 
and primary schools). Mr. Philbrick, in a report to the General As- 
sembly of Connecticut (May, 1856), described the plan for grading 
schools which he introduced in the Quincy School, and which might, 
with minor modifications, be taken as a description of the plan upon 
which city schools of to-day are organized.^ 

Prior to the date of this report (1856) primary schools in Boston, 
from the time of their establishment (1818), had been conducted on 
the " ungraded plan " — that is, the unit group taught by each teacher 
was a separate and independent organization, occupying a separate 
building, usually of one room. The course of instruction was divided 
into six steps or classes, but each teacher had all the six classes in her 
room at the same time.^ She was fitting a class for the grammar 
school, teaching a class of A-B-C-darians, and carrying on the inter- 
mediate stages of the course, simultaneously. This arrangement was 
gradually changed by carrying down into the primary schools the 
" graded plan " of the grammar schools. This led to the promotion 
of pupils every six months from one primary teacher to another; 
which, at that time, meant transferring from one primary building 
to another. The primary schools of a given attendance district came 
to have an organic connection with each other, which made it nec- 
essary that some one should be charged with the responsibility of 
supervising the group with respect to the admission of pupils, their 
proper classification, and their qualifications for promotion. This need 
became apparent about the time the shift from the " double-headed " 
to the " single-headed " plan of organization in the grammar schools 
took place (1848. Quincy School). The solution of the twofold prob- 
lem was at once obvious — namely, to relieve the gi-ammar-school mas- 
ter of his teaching duties, and require him to exercise the duties of a 
principal throughout his district, both in the grammar school and in 
the primary schools tributary to it. By this arrangement a higher 
degree of unity, harmony, and efficiency throughout the entire system 
was secured. 

1 See Philbrick Report (1867-68K pp. 522-23; also in his Twenty-ninth Semiannual 
Report, Sept., 1874, pp. 104-108. 

* See Philbrick, Report of the Superintendent of Common Schools to the General Assem- 
bly (Connecticut, May, 1856), in Am. Jour. Ed. (18.56), vol. 2, pp. 469-472. 

•■' In 1821 the course provided for four classes. For the detailed " course " of this date, 
see Am. Jour. Ed. (1870). vol. 19, p. 471. 



RISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 31 

Naturally the next step taken was that of combining the six sepa- 
rate primary school buildings, which were one-room affairs, built 
according to no recognized standard or model plan, and erecting one 
structure of six rooms, comprising a completely organized and clas- 
sified primary school. The first building in accordance with this plan 
was erected in Boston in 1864.^ 

While in Boston the primary and grammar schools covered the 
entire period of elementary education, in several other cities the 
elementary period, as the school organization developed, came to be 
made up of a union of three, and in some instances of four divisions, 
each separately designated, and varying in the time required for its 
completion. For example, in Concord, N. H., before 1860, the schools 
had been graded into " primary," " intermediate," and " grammar " 
schools. The primary and intermediate schools were scattered in 
small buildings in different parts of the district, while the three 
grammar schools gathered their pupils from wider districts and the 
high school from the entire city.^ In Harrisburg, Pa., the school 
divisions below the high school were designated "primary" and 
"secondary."^ In Hartford, Conn., the divisions were called "pri- 
mary," " secondary," " intermediate," and " grammar."* In In- 
dianapolis, Ind., the elementary division compassed the "primary" 
and "intermediate " divisions, each four years in length.^ In Kings- 
ton, N. Y., the terms "primar3^" "junior," and "senior" were ap- 
plied to the three divisions into which this period was broken, while 
the high-school period was called the "academic" division.® In 
Madison, Wis., to mention but one more instance, the designations 
were " primary," intermediate," " grammar," " senior grammar," and 
" high schools," each of two years.^ 

At first these divisions, which were due to various local causes, 
were pretty definitely separated, promotion from one to another in 
many instances being based upon formal examination, but gradu- 
ally the lines of demarcation fell away, leaving the designating 
terms for the several divisions without significance other than that 
of indicating their distinct origins. From time to time various 
changes in nomenclature have been made, usually in the direction of 
simplification, until now the common practice applies the term " ele- 
mentary " to all grades below the high school, " primary " to the first 
four or five years or grades, and " grammar " to the upper three or 

^ For most of the facts respecting primary school organization, see Philbrick, Twenty- 
ninth Semiannual Report (Sept., 1874), pp. 84-88; 108-111. 

2 Henry Barnard, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1870), vol. 19, p. 86. 

3 Ibid., p. 94. 
* Ibid., p. 95. 
BIbid., p. 96. 
« Ibid., p. 97. 

' Ibid., p. 100. 



32 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBIJC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

four. Occasionally, however, the term " intermediate '' is used in its 
early sense, referring somewhat loosely to the fourth or fifth gi'ades, 
or perhaps to the fourth, fifth, and sixth grades. In recent discus- 
sion, it should be noted, the term " intermediate " is sometimes em- 
ployed to designate the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades, though 
this will probably give way to either the " lower high school " or the 
"junior high school." 

To secure any semblance of grading in the schools of the rural 
communities and of the villages proved exceedingly difficult. In 
1839 Henry Barnard wrote that " there was hardly an instance of the 
gradation of schools [in Connecticut] by which the evils of crowding 
children of different ages, of both sexes, in every variety of study and 
schoolbook, under a single teacher, were avoided."^ And again he 
wrote, in Principles of School Architecture:^ 

To enable children to derive the highest degree of benefit from their attend- 
ance at school they should go through a regular course of training in a succes- 
sion of classes and schools arranged according to similarity of age, standing, 
and attainments, under teachers possessing the qualifications best adapted to 
each grade of school. The practice has been almost universal in New England 
and in other States where the organization of the schools is based upon the 
division of territory into school districts to provide but one school for as many 
children of both sexes and of all ages, from 4 to 16 years, as can be gathered in 
from certain territorial limits, into one ai)artment. under one teacher — a female 
teacher in summer and a male teacher in winter. The disadvantages of this 
practice, both to pupils and teachers, are great and manifold. 

On the same theme Horace Mann wrote, 1842 : 

There is but one class of persons in the whole community — and that class not 
only small in number, but the least entitled to favor — who are beneficially inter- 
ested in the establishment of small and feeble districts. This class consists of 
the very poorest teachers in the State, or of those who emigrate here from other 
States or countries in quest of employment as teachers^ M^ho are willing to teach 
for the lowest compensation, and for whose services even the lowest is too high. 
These teachers may safely look upon the small and feeble districts as estates in 
expectancy. Such districts, having destroyed their resources by dividing them, 
must remain stationary from year to year amidst surrounding improvement; 
and hence, being unable to command more valuable services, they will be com- 
pelled to grant a small annual pension to ignorance and imbecility, and this 
class of teachers stands ready to be their pensionaries.* 

In 1842, to quote another writer of the time, Alonzo Potter, in dis- 
cussing the unnecessary multiplication of school districts, particu- 
larly in the State of New York, said : 

In 1815, when the system (of New York State) was organized, the whole 
State contained but 2,756 districts. These have since been divided and sub- 

1 Henry Barnard, First An. Rep. (to Connecticut Legislature), extracts in Am. Jour. 
Ed. (1856), vol. 1, pp. 669-676. 

2 In I'roc. of the Am. Ed. Conventions (18'49-1852). 

3 Mann, Fifth An. Rep. (1842), p. 30; also in Potter, The School (1846), pp. 211- 
212. 



RISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 33 

divided till they number now 10,769. The present average rate of attendance 
appears, from the reports of the visitors (school inspectors) in 1840 and 1841. 
to be less than 35. It must be evident that such a school is not sufficiently 
large to fully occupy or remunerate the services of a first-rate teacher; and 
hence instead of multiplying districts still further, as is often the disposition 
at present, it is very important to diminish their number. The process of unit- 
ing tvpo or more adjacent districts or of forming tvpo out of three ought to be 
commenced at once, and it might be carried on through our smaller villages 
and the more thickly settled rural districts with the greatest advantage. The 
schools, being larger, would admit of a more thorough classification of the 
scholars ; being kept throughout the year, the organization would be more per- 
manent and effective, and the manifold evils growing out of the constant change 
of teachers might be obviated.^ 

The first step taken in the direction of grouping children of the 
same ages or attainments in rural schools appears to have been that 
of merely separating the older from the younger children and em- 
ploying a man to teach the former and a woman the latter. In his 
fourth annual report to the Connecticut Legislature (1842) Henry 
Barnard wrote : 

The evils of crowding children of different ages in a great variety of studies, 
and in different stages of progress in the same study, under one teacher, 
have been obviated in more than 100 districts by employing a female teacher 
for the younger children and primary studies and a male teacher for older and 
more advanced scholars, and in a few instances by the establishment of a cen- 
tral or union school for the older children of a society, or of two or more 
districts.^ 

As the school attendance of a given district increased, either 
through growth of population or through the consolidation of dis- 
tricts, the segregation was carried further by removing the older 
children to a point central to the joint district, while the younger 
children were left behind to attend at their several schools. In de- 
scribing this arrangement, Henry Barnard, in the report just referred 
to (fourth), said: 

Provision is made (in the law) for the union of two or more districts, for 
the purpose of maintaining a union school for the older children of the asso- 
ciated districts, while the younger children are left to attend in the several 
districts under female teachers. 

The union of school districts thus authorized obviates many of the diffi- 
culties and evils of common schools as they are, and secures a much higher 
degree of improvement with the same means. In a large portion of the dis- 
trict schools the ages of the scholars range from 4 to 16, or, rather, from 
3 to 18. The studies extend from the first rudiments to the branches of an 
academical education; the classes are as numerous as the various studies. 

1 Potter, The Scliool (1846, Harper & Bro.), pp. 210-213. 

2 Am. Jour. Ed. (1856), vol. 1, p. 718. 



34 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

increased by the variety of textbooiis in tlie same branch; and the teachers 
are constantly chaii.i;ing. from male to female, and from season to season. 

Now the plan of union districts, leaving the younger children by themselves, 
and including the older children together, cuts down by one-half the variety 
of ages, studies, and classes. It enables the teacher to adopt methods of classi- 
fication, instruction, and government suited to each grade of school.^ 

This plan of consolidating districts and forming union schools 
was the first step taken in the movement, not completed at the present 
day, toward nnifving and standardizing the school organization. 
]t was the first effort in opposition to the tendency toward decen- 
tralization, which arose naturally under the conditions which pre- 
vailed in the days when population was sparse. Each cluster of 
families found it more convenient to establish a separate school 
than to send their children to a more remote population center. The 
region contributing to such a school formed the school district, which, 
in Massachusetts, was without legal rights until 1789. The act 
of this date gave to the district privileges so extensive as to lead 
Horace Mann, in his tenth annual report, to declare the provision 
to be "the most unfortunate law on the subject of common schools 
ever enacted in the State." The most disastrous legislation came, 
however, in 1801, when the district was granted the authority to 
raise money for the support of its schools by taxation — a right here- 
tofore vested in the town. The district proved to be too small to be 
intrusted with the tax-levying power, and insufficient support of the 
school resulted. 

In one form or another the district school system still exists in most 
of the States, though there is a growing tendency, where conditions 
will admit, to replace the district with the township unit and the 
incorporated city. IMassachusetts abolished the district plan of or- 
ganization in 1882; New Hampshire in 1886; Vermont in 1892; and 
Maine in 1893.^ 

The movement toward graded schools developed slowly at first, 
but by 1860 nearly every city and town of any consequence in the 
country, as well as many populous rural communities, had its own 
unified system of schools organized on a graded basis and with a 
defined course of study, embracing definite time limits, the whole 
sanctioned and protected by legislative enactment. The following 
table, compiled mainly from the Special Report of the Commissioner 
of Education on the Condition and Improvement of Public Schools 
in the District of Columhia (1870)=^ gives the significant facts re- 
specting the status of the movement between the years 1860 and 
1 870 in the principal cities of the United States. 

lAm. Jour. Ed. (1856), vol. 1, p. 713. 

2 For discussion of the Unit, see Educ. Bull., 1914, Nos. 30 and 44. 

sin Am. Jour. Ed. (1870), vol. 19. 



EISE OF THE GEADED SCHOOL. 35 

Legal school age and school courses in certain cities.^ 



Cities. 



Boston, Mass 

Cambridge, Mass 

Chicago, 111 

Ciaciniiati, Ohio 

Cleveland, Ohio 

Columbus, Ohio 

Dayton, Ohio 

Detroit, Mich 

Dubuq ue , Iowa 

Fond du Lac, Wis 

Fort Wayne , Ind 

Hartford, Conn 

Indianapolis, Ind 

Kingston, N. Y 

Louisville, Ky 

Lowell, Mass 

Madison, Wis 

Manchester, N. II 

MHwauiiee, Wis 

Nashville, Tenn 

New Bedford, Mass. . . 
Newburyport, Mass. . . 
New Brunswick, N. J. 

New Haven, Conn 

New Orleans, La 

NewYork, N. Y 

Newark, N. J 

Niles, Mich 

Oswego, N. Y 

Philadelphia, Pa 

Portsmouth, N. II 

Providence, R. I 

Rochester, N. Y 

Rutland, Vt 

Sacramento, Cal 

San Francisco, Cal 

Springfield, 111 

Springfield, Mass 

St. Louis, Mo 

Syracuse, N. Y 

Terre Haute , Ind 

Toledo, Ohio 

Troy,N. Y 

Washington, D. C 

Worcester, Mass 



Legal 
school age. 



Length of 

elementary- 
school 



Years. 



Length of 

high-school 

course. 



Vears. 



{') 



Years. 
(2) 



{') 



(■') 



Earliest 

age of 

admission 

to high 

school. 



Vears. 



Ifl- 



1 See Rept. of U. S. Commis. of Educ, 1871, for list of over 600 secondary schools with length of high- 
school courses given. 

2 English high school, 4 years (1854); Latin high school, 6 years. 

3 English course and classical course, 3 years each; both, 4 years. 
* Seven years, with two years' extension of the course. 

' English course, 4 years; classical course, 3 years. 

By 1860 it became clear that the length of the elementary-school 
course was to be either seven, eight, or nine years, beginning at the 
age of 7, 6, or 5, with the preference for the arrangement which is 
now so general as to be typical — ^namely, an eight-year course, the 
child entering in his sixth year and completing the course in his 
fourteenth year. The organization of the elementary course in this 
final form was so nearly identical with the plan evolved among the 
German States and fully established therein prior to the inaugura- 
tion of a graded system in any American State as alone to make 
probable the indebtedness to Germany, even though no account be 



36 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

taken of the eagerness with which the American leaders of the period 
sought knowledge respecting German practice or of the high esteem 
in which the school system of that country was held by them. The 
tendency of Americans of this period to turn to Germany for sug- 
gestions attracted the attention of Francis Adams, an English writer, 
who made a study of the schools of the United States in 1875. He 
wrote : 

It is the habit of American edncationists, nngrudgingly and with sincere ad- 
miration, to give the palm to Germany. Nor is this a mere complimentary rec- 
ognition of excellence. It is shown to be genuine by the manner in which they 
are accepting from Germany not only lessons in the details of educational 
science, but vital principles like compulsion.^ 

As early as January, 1836, just at the beginning of the agitation to 
secure compulsory attendance and graded schools, the plan which 
had been developed in Prussia and which has been followed somewhat 
closely by us, was described by Prof. Stowe, who took his material 
largely from Cousin's report, in an address before a convention of 
teachers assembled at Columbus. The address, entitled The Prussian 
System of Public Instruction and its ApplicahiUty to the United 
/States, was brought to the attention of the General Assembly of 
Ohio and was ordered printed and circulated by that body. It was 
also published independently in the same year (1836) and widely 
distributed.^ Doubtless it was this address which lead the general 
assembly to request Prof. Stowe to present a formal report on the 
European trip which he was then about to make.^ In this report of 
his visit to the schools of Europe, prefacing a detailed description of 
the course outlined for each grade of the Prussian and Wurttemberg 
schools, he sketched the plan as follows: 

The whole course comprises eight years and includes children from the ages 
of 6 till 14, and it is divided into four parts of two years each. It is a first 
principle that the children be well accommodated as to house and furniture. 
The schoolroom must be well constructed, the seats convenient, and the 
scholars made comfortable and kept interested. The younger pupils are kept 
at school but four hours in the day — two in the morning and two in the even- 
ing — with a recess at the close of each hour. The older, six hours, broken by 
recesses as often as is necessary. Most of the schoolhouses have a bathing 
place, a garden, and a mechanics' shop attached to them to promote the cleanli- 
ness and health of the children and to aid in mechanical and agricultural 
instruction.* 

1 Francis Adams, The Free School System of the United States (1875), p. 239. 

2 See the Truman & Smith edition, Cincinnati (1836), in the Boston Public Library. 

3 See the account given, p. 24. 

^ Stowe, Report on Elementary Puhlic Instruction in Europe (Boston edition, 1838), 
pp. 27, 28. A detailed summary of the report in Western Literary Institute, Transac- 
tions (1837), pp. 204—228; also Course of Instruction in the Primary Schools of 
Germany, In Am. Jo. Ed. (1860), Vol. VIII, pp. 371-382. 



RISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 37 

Prof. Stowe strongly urged the adoption of the Prussian plan, as 
the concluding lines of his report show : 

The above system is no visionary scheme emanating from the closet of a 
recluse, but a sketch of the course of instruction now actually pursued by 
thousands of schoolmasters in the best district schools that have ever been 
organized. It can be done, for it has been done; it is now done and it ought 
to be done. If it can be done in Europe, I believe it can be done in the United 
States ; if it can be done in Prussia, I know it can be done in Ohio. The people 
have but to say the word and provide the means and the thing is accomplished, 
for the word of the people here is even more powerful than the word of the 
king there, and the means of the people here are altogether more abundant for 
such an object than the means of the sovereign there. Shall this object, then, 
so desirable in itself, so entirely practicable, so easily within our reach, fail 
of accomplishment? For the honor and welfare of our State, for the safety 
of our whole Nation, I trust it will not fail, but that we shall soon witness in 
this Commonwealth the introduction of a system of common-school instruction 
fully adequate to all the wants of our population.^ 

Except for the fact that in certain particulars our schools have not 
yet reached the development which Prof. Stowe reports, the fore- 
going description would fit remarkably well our elementary school 
system as it now exists. 

An examination of the school codes of the German States will show 
that, in almost every case, the laws provided that the child should enter 
school in his sixth year and remain in attendance, if a Catholic, until 
time for his first communion, or, if evangelical in his church affilia- 
tions, to the time of confirmation, the two rites usually occurring at the 
same age — namely, in the fourteenth year. Thus, for example, in 
Saxony, the village schools were attended by the children of the 
parish from their sixth to their fourteenth or fifteenth year — full 
eight years — whereupon they were, after from three to six months' 
instruction in religion by the parish clergyman, " confirmed " as 
Christians, and after that, for the first time, admitted to the Lord's 
table.^ In the Duchy of Coburg the children were admitted in their 
sixth year, and excused from attending the schools only on taking 
their first communion.^ In Saxe-Meiningen boys and girls in the 
country were obliged to attend school eight years, from their sixth 
to their fourteenth year, while boys living in the city had to remain 
one year longer. The discharge from school coincided with admis- 
sion to the first communion.* In Wurttemberg the obligation resting 
upon the children to attend school began for both boys and girls with 

1 Stowe's Report, p. 53. 

2 Dr. Hermann Wimmer, Piiilic Instruction in Saxony, in Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), Vol. XX, 
p. 554. 

*Dr. Bberhard, Public Instruction in Saxe-Coburg-Ootha, in Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), Vol. 
XX, p. 602. 

* Barnard, Public instruction in Saxe-Meiningen, in Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), Vol. XX, pp. 
608, 609. 



38 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

the seventh and terminated with the fourteenth year. Well-devel- 
oped children, however, were received in their sixth year, though no 
one could be discharged from school until after confirmation or the 
first communion.^ 'In his report, as special commissioner to an Eng- 
lish parliamentary commission (1861), Prof. Mark Pattison, of 
Oxford, pointed out that the corner stone of the system of primary 
education throughout Germany was compulsory school attendance; 
that it was all but universal among the German States, though its 
mode of enforcement was variable; that the usage of the several 
States varied but little respecting school age, the Prussian code fixing 
the end of the child's fifth year as the time when attendance should 
begin; that in some provinces attendance was not compelled until 
the end of the sixth, though permitted at the end of the fifth; that 
the duration of compulsory school attendance in most of the States 
was eight years, though in some parts of Prussia usage extended it 
to nine, and in one instance cited it was reduced to seven years ; and 
that "much less by law than by the manners of the people, school 
time is universally terminated by confirmation — a rite which, with 
its accompanying first communion, obtains in the Lutheran popula- 
tion the same social importance as in the Roman Catholic." ^ 

It seems clear that the duration of the period devoted to elemen- 
tary education was determined originally by the church, and that the 
practices thus begim were subsequently sanctioned by legal enact- 
ment. Pattison points out^ that when, in the beginning of the 
eighteenth century, Frederick Wilhelm began to issue royal ordi- 
nances for the regulation and improvement of elementary schools, 
these ordinances assumed universal school attendance of all uncon- 
firmed persons. He adds : 

The usage, as part of the duty of a Christian parent, had even survived the 
ruin of the Thirty Years' War. In Wurttemberg it has existed by legal enact- 
ment ever since the year following the peace of Westphalia (1649). The edict 
of 1716, which is popularly regarded as the source of the Prussian compulsory 
system, does really nothing more than give the sanction of a royal ordinance 
to an existing practice. The AUgemeineslandschulreglement of 1763 for the 
first time exactly defines the age, viz, from 5 to 14 ; but this was only defining 
an obligation universally admitted as one of the first duties of the citizen and 
the member of the church. 

Prof. G. Stanley Hall considers the rites of confirmation and the 
first communion as the objective recognition given by the church to 
the advent of puberty. He holds that the pubic initiations among 
savage peoples, the ephebic educational ceremonies of the ancient 
Greeks and Romans, the inspiring observances practiced at the 
knighting of the medieval youth, and the ceremonies attendant upon 

1 Barnard, Public Instruction in Wurttem'berfj, Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 661. 
-See digest of Pattison's report, in Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 19, pp. 617, et acq. 
3 Ibid., p. 620. 



EISE OF THE GRADED SCHOOL. 39 

religious confirmation among the Jews, Catholics, Eussians, Episco- 
palians, and Lutherans all testify to the recognition by the race of 
the critical nature of the period thus ushered in. Thirteen and 14 
or 14 and 15 are the customary ages at which these rites of the 
church are administered, the former prevailing in the Episcopal 
Church of England and America and the latter among the Lutheran 
Churches of Europe. Prof. Hall points out, however, that in Italy 
the lowest age at which confirmation may take place is 7, in France 
and Belgium 10, while in the Greek Russian Church confession, 
which takes the place of first communion and confirmation, occurs 
at about the age of 8. The explanation of these variations, he thinks, 
lies in this, that they are among pubescent customs which have grad- 
ually moved forward to an earlier time in the child's life, thereby 
losing much of their original significance. Respecting the tendency 
to fix the age formally at 14, Prof. Hall gives a suggestive excerpt 
from Leopold Low,^ who states that in early times " puberty was 
determined by individual signs of ripeness"; that later, legalistic 
tendencies operated toward establishing a definite age, and that in 
fixing the same 14 was attractive, in being twice the sacred number 7.- 

1 Low, Die Lebensalter in der Judischen Literature, Szegedin, 1875, p. 457. 

2 For a survey of the field referred to in this paragraph, see Hall, Adolescence, vol. 2, 
Ch. XIII. 



Chapter III. 

EFFORTS TOWARD A FUNCTIONAL REORGANIZATION 
THE FIRST DECADE OF THE DISCUSSION. 



Contents. — Attempts at reform — The demand for a reorganization — The universality of 
the tripartite arrangement ; ancient Greeks ; Roman youths ; Melancthon's plan ; 
Comenius's divisions ; in the American States ; theories as to origin — President 
Eliot's attack ; efforts of the Harvard faculty ; the discussion taken up by colleges 
and universities— The studies made under the auspices of the National Education 
Association ; the report of the Committee of Ten ; the report of the Committee of 
Fifteen ; the report of the Committee on College Entrance Requirements — The in- 
fluence of President Butler — Summary of the first decade of the discussion. 



The educational discussions and the educational practices of the 
last two decades show the existence of tendencies toward abandoning 
the present arbitrary divisions of the public-school system for a 
system wherein natural function shall determine the parts and their 
relations. The extending of the election of studies from university 
and college down through the high schools, and, in some instances, 
into the upper grades of the elementary schools; the adoption of de- 
partmental teaching in the high school and in the older elementary 
grades; the endeavor to secure greater flexibility in grading and in 
promotion ; and the introduction of industrial and vocational train- 
ing into the schools are the directions in which effort has been ex- 
pended to make more effective a system based largely upon tradition. 
While these tendencies express a recognition that the present system 
is imperfect, the reforms contemplated do not necessarily imply a 
reorganization of our grouping by years, but suggest, rather, an 
improvement within the conJEines of our traditional scheme. The 
discussions, however, ranging over such questions as shortening and 
enriching the elementary curriculum, the six-year " high-school col- 
lege," the extension of the field of secondary education both upward 
and downward, the shortening of the time for colleges, the establish- 
ment of the "junior college," and the substitution of a triennial 
classification for our present quadrennial arrangement, go further 
and squarely demand that our school system be reorganized. 

The threefold arrangement, elementary, secondary, and higher, 

which comprises our school system, is a form of organization that 

has become universal among the countries providing a systematic 

education, though wide differences obtain respecting the years em- 

40 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATIO?f FIRST DECADE. 41 

braced in each division, the closeness of the articulation of the 
divisions, and the types of schools which have been evolved to pro- 
vide instruction. This arrangement was characteristic of the educa- 
tional practices of ancient Greece.^ The first period beyond infancy, 
extending from the beginning of the sixth or eighth year to the end 
of the fourteenth or sixteenth year, was the period of school educa- 
tion ; the second, extending from the beginning of the fourteenth or 
sixteenth year to the end of the twentieth or twenty-first (in Sparta, 
the thirtieth), was that of college education; and the third, from 
about the twentieth on, was devoted to university education.^ 

The education of the Roman youth also came to be broken into 
this threefold arrangement a century or more before the Christian 
era. Upon reaching his sixth or seventh year the Roman child began 
his elementary instruction either at home or in a lundus puhlicus^ 
where he learned reading, writing, and simple calculation. At about 
the age of 12 the boy passed into the school of the grarrwnaticus, 
where he was instructed in grammar, in the narrower sense, learned 
portions of Homer and other poets by heart, and began the critical 
study of literature and composition. At the age of about 16 the 
boy exchanged the toga praetexta for the toga virilis, a ceremony 
which marked the assimiption of the responsibilities of manhood. 
His education thenceforth depended upon his future occupation. 
Those intended for a farmer's life went to live at some farm station ; 
those intended for the army passed into the service; and those in- 
tended for public life or for pleaders and jurists went to the rhetori- 
cal schools, and thereafter attended the forum, the comifia, and the 
senate, attaching themselves to some admired orator or jurist.^ 

In modern times the beginning of an articulated system of educa- 
tion was faintly foreshadowed in the school plan of Philip Melanc- 
thon (1528). After visiting the churches and schools of Thuringia, 
at the instance of the Elector, he recommended that children be ar- 
ranged in three distinct groups, the first consisting of those who are 
learning to read ; the second, those who have learned to read and are 
ready for grammar; and the third, comprising those who, having 
become proficient in grammar, are ready to take up prosody and 
advanced work in the classics.* Crude attempts were made by 
Melancthon's contemporaries, Sturm (1537)^ and Trotzendorf 
(1531),® to develop a school organization. The schools of these men, 

1 Davidson, Aristotle and Ancient Educational Ideals, p. 36. 

2 Ibid., pp. 173-183. 

3 Laurie, Historical Survey of Pre-Christian Education, Clis. II-III. 

* Copious extracts from Melancthon, Booh of Visitation (1528), in Am. Jour. Ed. 
(1857), Vol. IV, pp. 749-751. 

s Sturm's course of study is given in detail, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1857), vol. 4, pp. 
169-182. 

" Ttie monitorial system of Trotzendorf is dpscribert by Kar) Von Raumer, in Am. .Tour. 
Ed. (1858), vol. 5, pp. 107-113. 



42 eeokganizatiojSt of the public school system. 

in turn, formed the general model upon which the German schools 
of the sixteenth century were organized, instanced by the school 
codes of Wurttemberg (1559) and Saxony (1580), the purpose of 
which was stated in the preamble to the former, as follows: "To 
carry youth from the elements through successive grades to the 
degree of culture demanded for offices in the church and state." ^ 
However, the first formulated plan for a system of education, com- 
prehensive in scope and articulated in its parts, was not made until 
it was proposed by Comenius. 

Comenius's plan comprised three divisions, following infancy, 
corresponding to the three periods of childhood, adolescence, and 
youth.^ For the period of childhood, beginning at 6 and continuing 
to 12, Comenius would provide the " vernacular " or elementary 
school. For the period of adolescence, which he places between the 
years of 12 and 18, there is to be organized the " Latin " or secondary 
school. Finally, his scheme provides that during the period of 
youth from 18 to 24 the university (academia) and travel shall afford 
the means for higher education. So far behind theories, however, do 
practices lag that two and a half centuries elapsed before such an 
organization of schools as that suggested by the great Moravian 
reformer became common among the civilized nations of the world. 

While the American arrangement of a tripartite division of edu- 
cation and of schools, therefore, conforms to the practice of all 
progressive countries and is based upon psychological as well as 
physiological facts,^ yet in respect to the quadrennial grouping that 
comprises each of its divisions America stands alone. Among the 
States and localities until within a very few years great variation in 
the length of each division has obtained. The elementary division 
has ranged in length from 6 to 9 and in a few^ places to 10 and even 11 
years. Some localities when establishing high schools provided for 
but two years of secondary work, others for three, and still others 
for four. As late as 1888 so great was the variation in the time 
allotted to high-school courses that the department of secondary 
education of the National Education Association adopted a formal 
resolution demanding that the high-school period be made uniformly 
four years.* Upon the founding of Harvard it was provided, in 
imitation of English usage, that the degree of bachelor of arts could 
be secured in three years. Before the beginning of the eighteenth 

^ Early School Codes of Germany, by Karl Von Raumer, in Am. Jour. Ed. (1859), 
Vol. VI, pp. 426-434. 

a Comenius Didactica, Chs. XXVII-XXXI : also Monroe, Comenius, pp. 103-106. 
a See discussion by Hinsdale, Sch. Rev. (1806), vol. 4, pp. 513-522. 
*Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1888, pp. 403-4. 



EFFORTS TOWAKD EEORGANIZATION FIRST DECADE. 43 

century, however, in view of deficient preparation the course was 
lengthened to four years. In 1850 Brown University defined the 
amount of study for the degree of bachelor of arts as "something 
that may be accomplished in three years, but which may, if he pleases, 
occupy the student profitably for four years." In 1876, when Johns 
Hopkins University was thrown open, the undergraduate course for 
the degree of bachelor of arts was three years, though the admission 
requirements were somewhat higher for such students.^ Now eight 
years constitute the elementary course, four years the secondary, and 
four years the collegiate in the States, except in New England and 
the Southern States, where for the most part the elementary course 
embraces nine years in the one and seven years in the other. 

Some have tried to trace this arrangement back to the medieval 
quadrivium, but that should lead to four great subjects rather than 
to a quadrennium.^ Others have tried to show, with poor success, 
that this grouping has evolved naturally and in response to the 
operation of social forces which are irresistible in their operation. 

The first public utterance of weight that called into serious ques- 
tion the organization of the school system was that of President 
Eliot, at the Washington meeting of the Department of Superin- 
tendence of the National Education Association in 1888. In this 
address, entitled " Can School Programmes be Shortened and En- 
riched?"^ President Eliot asserted that for the past 60 years the 
average age of college admission has steadily risen, reaching 18 
years and 10 months at Harvard, and that the period beyond col- 
lege graduation required for professional training had lengthened to 
three or four years, with the result that " the average college gradu- 
ate who fits himself well for any one of the learned professions, 
including teaching, can hardly begin to support himself before he 
is 27 years old." In this epoch-making address he maintained the 
desirability of condensing school courses to gain time and of increas- 
ing the efficiency of instruction in order to secure as high an admis- 
sion standard as formerly. He also asserted that this was entirely 
possible by improving the teaching force of the schools through a 
better tenure of office and by raising the proportion of male teachers 
in the schools ; by the improvement of school programs, making them 
substantial and interesting; by diminishing the number of reviews, 
and by never aiming at the kind of accuracy which reviews, followed 
by examinations, are intended to enforce; by developing means 
which will insure a normal rate of promotion from grade to grade; 
and by securing a longer school day and term. 

1 Wright, Sch. Rev. (1897), vol. 5, pp. 696-709. 

2 See statement by Gilman, Educ. Rev. (Jan., 1891), vol. 1, p. 3. 

3 For address in full, see Eliot, Educational Reform, pp. 151-176; also in Nat. Ed. 
Assoc, 1888, pp. 101-118, printed in Bu. of Educ. Circulars, 1888. 

5930°— 16 4 



44 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

This question of the steadily increasing age at which students 
enter college was one that had seriously concerned the Harvard 
president and his faculty for many years. As far back as 1872-73 
this tendency had been publicly noted. In his report of that date, 
President Eliot, in discussing certain changes which had been made 
in the admission requirements of Harvard, pointed out that, while 
these had been essentially modified, they had not been made more 
difficult, and he added : 

The average age of admission has gradually risen until it is now a little 
over 18 years, and the college faculty, thinking that age to be high enough, do 
not wish to require for admission anything more than a boy of 18 of fair 
capacity and industry may reasonably be expected to have learned.* 

In his report of 1885-86 President Eliot again referred to this 
matter, asserting that three years of the discussion of admission 
requirements by the college faculty had resulted in the adoption of 
a compromise measure, which was expected to assist in bringing 
down the average age of admission to 18 or thereabouts. He added: 

At present about two-fifths of the freshmen are over Id at entrance — a con- 
dition of things which the faculty views with concern.* 

This situation, which was observed with growing alarm by the 
Harvard faculty, led to remedial efforts of four kinds: (1) Modi- 
fying college entrance requirements; (2) urging the parents of 
prospective college students to send their sons to college as soon as 
the latter were qualified; (3) shortening the college course from four 
years to three years; and (4) persuading the elementary and sec- 
ondary schoolmen generally to condense their courses. 

The first of these movements, as has already been noted, can be 
traced back to the academic year 1872-73, when the Harvard faculty 
introduced a greater variety in the list of Latin and Greek authors 
from W'hich selection was to be made; diminished the amount of 
Latin to be read, substituting therefor a book on Roman history; 
added a requirement in English composition ; and permitted the can- 
didate to take an examination on one-half of his preparatory work 
a year before his prescribed secondary work was completed,^ From 
time to time modifications were made, both in the subjects required 
and in the manner and time of conducting the examinations; such 
changes operating to secure greater flexibility, and yet being in- 
tended to maintain a standard of proficiency which the faculty 
deemed a youth of 18 could properly be expected to attain. Though 
options had been granted within the limits of given subjects, it was 
not until 1882 that the faculty took up the serious discussion of the 
extent to which options among different subjects should be allowed 

1 Harvard Reports, 1872-73, p. 10. 

2 Ibid., 1885-86, pp. 7-0. 

s Ibid., 1872-73, pp, 47-51. 



EFFOETS TOWAKD EEOEGANIZATION FIEST DECADE. 45 

in the examination for admission to college.^ Three years later, 
1885-86, this discussion was brought to a conclusion by the adoption 
of a measure which provided that secondary schools might submit 
three programs: (1) The classical program then in force, comprising 
in the main Latin, Greek, and mathematics; (2) a program retaining 
the elements of Greek and developing modern languages, mathematics, 
and physical science; (3) a program retaining the elements of Latin 
and developing English, modern languages, science, and history.^ 

The second of these movements grew out of a consideration of the 
results of the entrance examinations of 1888, which were held under 
the new plan of optional requirements announced two years before. 
These showed that between 6 and 7 per cent of the freshman class 
had passed their admission examinations one or more years before 
entering college, and that the parents were keeping many of their 
sons back, thinking that they were too young to begin their college 
work.^ In 1890 the board of overseers, upon the recommendation of 
the college faculty, authorized the president to send the following 
letter to the parents of high-school graduates : * 

To parents and teachers of boys who intend to enter Harvard College: 

In the opinion of all the college authorities the present average age of fresh- 
men entering Harvard College (19 years) is undesirably high. 

While recognizing the fact that unfavorable circumstances necessarily retard, 
beyond the most advantageous age, the preparation for college of many young 
men who derive great benefit from a college course, the faculty believes that 
boys who have regularly attended a good school ought to be fully prepared to 
enter with profit upon their college course by the time they are 18 years old, or 
even before that age. The faculty thinks it unwise, as a rule, for parents or 
guardians to keep in school boys who are really prepared for college, or to keep 
out of college boys who have passed the admission examinations, unless because 
of ill health or of unusual immaturity of character. 

The faculty respectfully requests the cooperation of all teachers who prepare 
boys for Harvard College, in the efCort to reduce the average age of admission. 

The third plan which was proposed by the Harvard faculty, that 
of shortening the period of college education, was the most radical 
method suggested of lowering the age at which students might take 
up their professional work. It aroused vigorous discussion, as well 
as vehement protest, both among the Harvard faculty and among 
college teachers generally. The discussion was precipitated by a 
resolution of the academic council, voted in November, 1887 — 

that with a view to lower the average age at which bachelors of arts of Harvard 
College can enter the professional schools and the graduate department, the col- 
lege faculty be requested to consider the expediency of a reduction of the college 
course.^ * 

1 Harvard Reports, 1882-83, pp. 16, 17. 

3 Ibid., 1885-86, pp. 7-9. 

3 Ibid., 1887-88, p. 7. 

* Ibid., 1889-90, pp. 8, 9. 

= Ibid., 1887-88, pp. 12, 13 ; see also Report of the College Dean, ibid., pp. 81-83. 



46 EEORGANIZATIOlSr OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

A year later, in discussing the matter, President Eliot said : 

Wherever the fault and whatever the remedy, it is clear that the degree of 
bachelor of arts is taken in the United States later than in any other country 
in which the degree is used, and too late for the best interests of the individuals 
who aspire to it and of the institutions which confer it/ 

In 1889-90, when the proposal was given full consideration, the 
college faculty recommended, " in the nature of a cautious experi- 
ment," certain provisions which would place the requirement of col- 
lege work about halfway between the regular work of the first three 
years and that of the whole four years.^ Finally, in April, 1891, the 
l^roposals were acted on by the board of overseers, which refused its 
consent, it being clear that the steps proposed had not yet fully com- 
mended themselves to a sufficient number of the teachers of the uni- 
versity.^ 

In 1902, on the initiative of the board of overseers, the faculty 
reformulated their requirements for the degree of bachelor of arts, 
providing a means whereby students of diligence and ability could 
complete their work in three years, or in three and a half years at 
most. In commenting on this action President Eliot expressed the 
end to which the faculty had consistently held, in the following 
words : 

The faculty of arts and sciences has now done what it can to combat the 
great evil of too late entrance upon the professional careers or the business 
career. It has expressed its preference for the age of IS as the age for enter- 
ing the college and its conviction that boys can be well prepared for college by 
that age, and it has made it possible for any diligent student to get the degree 
of bachelor of arts in three years. These two measures combined should 
enable parents to get their well-trained sons into the learned professions by 24 
or 25 years of age, and into business careers much earlier. To effect these 
improvements, however, the cooperation of parents, schools, and the community 
at large is essential.* 

The fourth of the measures employed to meet the problem of the in- 
creasing average age of college intrants w^as that of seeking to arouse 
among the school men of the country a willingness to condense their 
elementary and secondary courses. This movement was set in motion 
by President Eliot through his famous address of 1888, already 
alluded to. This address met with an immediate response, so imme- 
diate, indeed, that it led its author to say before the National Educa- 
tion Association four years later : 

On reviewing the progress of this reform since I had the honor of discussing 
the question, "Can school programs be shortened and enriched?" before this 

1 Harvard Reports, 1888-80, pp. 20-21. 

3 For a full and valuable discu.ssion, see Report of the College Dean, in Harvard 
Reports, 1889-90, pp. 103-107. 

Tor a full discus.sion of the projiTess of the movement, see Harvard Reports, 1800- 
01, pp. 7-9. 

* Harv.nrd Reports, 1001-2. pp. 24-28: and the Report of the Dean of the Faculty of 
Arts and Sciences, ibid., pp. 100-102. 



EFFORTS TOWAED EEOEGANIZATION FIEST DECADE. 47 

department of superintendence four years ago, I see many evidences that a 
great and beneficent change in public-school programs is rapidly advancing. The 
best evidence is to be found in tlie keen interest wliich superintendents and 
teachers talve in the discussion of the subject. Through them the proposed 
improvements will be brought out in detail ; their influence will be successfully 
exerted on parents, committees, and the public press; and their reward will be, 
first, the daily sight of happier and better-trained children, and, secondly, the 
.elevation of their own profession.^ 

These proposals, advanced by the Harvard faculty as hopeful 
methods of solving a specific problem which was becoming increas- 
ingly serious, started discussions among educators that quickly car- 
ried the participants into a critical examination of the entire range 
of the educational system, developing thereby, during the last two 
decades, a body of educational comment of great brilliancy and 
worth. Influenced partly by Harvard's example and partly by the 
fact that the problem was common to all, the faculties of practi- 
cally all the American colleges and universities took up the dis- 
cussion of the problems that concerned each, arriving in course of 
time at the conclusions and plans of procedure which the local needs 
and traditions respectively determined. An examination of the files 
containing the proceedings of such organizations as the Association 
of Colleges and Preparatory Schools of the Southern States, the 
Association of Colleges of the Middle States and Maryland, the 
North Central Association, and the New England Association of 
Colleges and Preparatory Schools, shows that much of the time of 
the annual conferences of these organizations held during the 
nineties was likewise given over to a discussion of similar questions. 
The first organization of national prominence, however, to take up 
this examination was the National Education Association. Through 
the National Council, the Department of Superintendence, and the 
Department of Secondary Education, it made scholarly contributions 
to the literature of the discussion. 

At the suggestion of President James H. Baker, University of 
Colorado (then a high-school principal), the National Council ap- 
pointed in 1892 a committee of 10 persons, of which President Eliot 
was made chairman, to arrange a series of conferences between 
the school and college teachers of each of the principal secondary 
subjects in order to determine the limits of each, the best methods 
of instruction, the most desirable allotment of time to the several 
subjects, and the best method of testing the pupil's attainments 
therein. Nine conferences on as many different secondary-school 
subjects were held, each in charge of a committee of 10. While the 
conferences were ostensibly held to discuss the period of secondary 
education, it was inevitable that many suggestions should be made 

^ See address. Shortening and EnricMng the Qrammar-School Course, in Eliot, Educa- 
tional Reform, p, 269. 



48 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

respecting the program of the elementary schools and of the col- 
lege period. In consequence, the Report of the Committee of Ten 
covers in many significant respects the entire range of the school 
system. 

While the grouping of eight years in the elementary division and 
lour years in that of the high school, now generally followed in 
the United States, had been sharply attacked prior to the publica- 
tion of the committee's report,^ yet in all of the discussions com- 
prising the report, the traditional grouping is assumed, although 
several of the subcommittees demanded an earlier introduction of 
secondary-school studies, and all desired to see given in the ele- 
mentary schools broad surveys of their respective subjects. The 
Latin conference compared the age at which Latin is begun in 
Europe and in this country, and expressed the hope — 

that such a modification of grammar-school courses can be made without delay 
as to render it possible that the high-school course — and with it the subject 
of Latin — may be begun not later than the age of 14.^ 

The Greek conference voted to concur with the Latin conference 
in its recommendations as to the age at which the study of Latin 
should be begun,^ and asserted that the average age at which pupils 
now enter college should be lowered rather than raised.* The con- 
ference on modern languages recommended that elective courses in 
German and French be provided in the grammar schools, beginning 
with the fifth grade.^ The conference on mathematics recommended 
that a course of instruction in concrete geometry be introduced into 
the grammar schools, and that some familiarity with algebraic ex- 
pressions and symbols should be acquired in connection with the 
course in arithmetic.*' The conferences on physics, chemistry, and 
astronomy, and on natural history would have the elements of those 
subjects begun in the first years of the elementary division and con- 
tinued throughout. The conference on history, civil government, and 
political economy " especially recommends such a choice of subjects 
as will give pupils in the grammar schools an opportunity to study 
the history of other countries." ^ In the spirit of the foregoing recom- 
mendations relating to an earlier beginning of secondary subjects 
the Committee of Ten concurred, in the following language : 

In preparing these programs the committee were perfectly aware that it is 
impossible to make a satisfactory secondary -school program limited to a period 

1 See Shinn's discussion of HiU's paper, " What can be done to bring pupils further on 
in their studies before they leave school to go to work ? " in Nat. Educ. Assoc., 1892, 
p. GGO. 

2 Report of the Committee of Ten, p. 01. 

3 Ibid., p. 85. 
* Ibid., p. 7G. 
6 Ibid., p. 96. 
8 Il)id., p. 106. 
' Ibid., p. 200. 



EFFOETS TOWAED EEOEGANIZATION FIEST DECADE. 49 

of four years and founded on the present elementary-school subjects and 
methods. In the opinion of the committee several subjects now reserved for 
the high schools, such as algebra, geometry, natural science, and foreign 
languages, should be begun earlier than now, and therefore within the schools 
classified as elementary ; or as an alternative, the secondary-school period 
should be made to begin two years earlier than at present, leaving six years 
instead of eight for the elementary-school period. Under the present organi- 
zation elementary subjects and elementary methods are, in the judgment 
of the committee, kept in use too long.^ 

Not only did the committee take advanced ground in respect to the 
relation of the secondary schools to the elementary schools, but it 
set forth, with even greater emphasis and distinctness, its concep- 
tion of the relation which should obtain between the secondary 
schools and the colleges, and in so doing it condemned, by implica- 
tion at least, much of our present practice. The committee declares : 

The secondary schools of the United States, taken as a whole, do not exist 
for the purpose of preparing boys and girls for colleges. Only an insignificant 
percentage of the graduates of these schools go to colleges or scientific schools 
Their main function is to prepare for the duties of life that small proportion 
of all the children in the country — a proportion small in number, but very im- 
portant to the welfare of the Nation — who show themselves able to profit by 
an education prolonged to the eighteenth year and whose parents are able to 
support them while they remain so long at school.^ 

And, again, the committee says : 

A secondary-school program intended for national use must therefore be made 
for those children whose education is not to be pursued beyond the secondary 
school. The preparation of a few pupils for college or scientific school should, 
in the ordinary secondary school, be the incidental and not the principal object.^ 

In short, the committee believes that the college should take the 
high-school student who has had four years of strong work where it 
finds him and without regard to the particular subjects which have 
comprised his curriculum, and that this "close articulation between 
the secondary schools and the higher institutions would be advantage- 
ous alike for the schools, the colleges, and the country." * 

This unusually able and suggestive report was taken up immedi- 
ately by the newspaper and magazine press, by the pulpit and plat- 
form, and by the foremost writers on education. In consequence the 
report commanded from the first an interest so widespread as to 
become national in its extent. It is interesting to observe, too, that 
this study of the secondary division of the American public-school 
system, made by the Committee of Ten, came at a time when the same 
division in each of the French, German, and English school systems 
was undergoing sharp scrutiny. 

1 Report of the Committee of Ten, p. 45, 

2 Ibid., p. 51. 

3 Ibid., pp. 51, 52. 
^ Ibid., p. 53. 



50 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

In 1890 both France and Germany appointed national commis- 
sions to study the work of the secondary school, and simultaneously 
with the final sitting of the Committee of Ten there convened at 
Oxford the first national meeting of schoolmasters and university 
professors ever held in England. It is significant that the questions 
foremost in debate at Paris, Berlin, Oxford, and New York were 
the same,^ and that independently of one another the conclusions 
reached were in remarkable accord in important particulars. 

A few months before this report of the Committee of Ten was 
published (1893), the Department of Superintendence of the Na- 
tional Education Association appointed a committee of 15 on 
elementary education that frankly raised for discussion the tradi- 
tional division of eight years elementary and four years high school 
and departmental teaching in the upper grammar grades. The 
members of this coi::mittee were divided into three subcommittees — 
one on the training of teachers, one on the correlation of studies in 
elementary education, and one on the organization of city school 
systems. Each subcommittee prepared and sent a questionnaire to 
representative school men and women throughout the country, and 
from the returns a report was prepared that was finally presented 
before the Department of Superintendence in 1895 at the Cleveland 
meeting. 

The only subcommittee which developed a discussion bearing on 
the function of,- the elementary division and on its relation to the 
secondary schools was the subcommittee on the correlation of studies, 
under the chairmanship of William T. Harris. Seventeen questions 
were submitted by it, of which four bore more or less directly on 
function : 

(1) Should the elementary course be eight years and the secondary course 
four years, as at present? Or should the elementary course be six years and 
the secondary course six years? (2) Should Latin or a modern language be 
taught in the elementary school course? If so, why (part of question No. 3)? 
(3) Should any subject, or group of subjects, be ti'eated differently for pupils 
who leave school at 12, 13, or 14 years of age, and for those who are going to 
a high school? (4) What considerations should determine the point at which 
the specialization of the work of teachers should begin? ^ 

The responses to these questions, with a few exceptions, showed 
hesitation at departing in any marked way from current theory or 
practice. The objection to shortening the elementary course to six 
years, held commonly by those replying to the first question, was 
the fear that such a step would cause many children to leave school. 
Indeed, several would have had the course lengthened to nine years 

1 Mackenzie, in Sch. Rev., vol. 2, pp. 146-147, discussing the report of the Committee 
of Ten. 

3 Report of Committee of Fifteen on Elementary Kducation, pp. 10-12. 



EFFORTS TOWAED KEOEGAlSriZATION FIEST DECADE. 51 

instead. In respect to beginning Latin or a modern language in the 
grades the responses were about equally divided between those who 
considered language study profitable and those who hold that the 
mind is not " mature enough to profit by classiciil training, as now 
pursued, until high-school age."^ The question whether or not a 
subject should be treated differently for pupils having different ob- 
jectives was answered almost unanimously in the negative. The 
tenor of the replies was that " the high school must be made to fit 
the boy; the boy should not be made to fit the high school."^ In 
the replies to the question relating to departmental teaching, no 
enthusiastic proponents were developed, but on the contrary some 
expressed strong opposition. 

The subcommittee reflected, in its report, the same hesitancy and 
conservatism. In referring to the questions relating to shortening 
the elementary course to six years and the earlier introduction of 
secondary studies, the committee reported as follows: 

Your committee is agreed that the time devoted to the elementary school 
work should not be reduced from eight years, but they have recommended, as 
hereinbefore stated, that in the seventh and eighth years a modified form of 
algebra be introduced in place of advanced arithmetic and that in the eighth 
year English grammar yield place to Latin. This makes, in their opinion, a 
proper transition to the studies of the secondary school and is calculated to 
assist the pupil materially in his preparation for that work. Hitherto the 
change from the work of the elementary school has been too abrupt, the pupil 
beginning three formal studies at once, namely, algebra, physical geography, and 
Latin.® 

In recommending this earlier introduction of algebra and Latin 
the committee was brought face to face with the question of the dif- 
ference between elementary and secondary subjects. The committee 
pointed out that whereas those subjects which current practice has 
assigned to the secondary division of study have been so assigned 
partly because of tradition, partly because of admission require- 
ments of higher institutions, and partly because of the intrinsic 
difficulties of the several subjects, yet there is a psychological factor 
which should determine the -division in which a given subject is 
classed, namely, that whatever deals with' the particular instance is 
relatively elementary, whatever deals with the general form is rela- 
tively secondary, and whatever has to do with the higher correlations 
of the facts and relations of natural and spiritual phenomena belongs 
to the division of higher education.* 

As to the question whether or not pupils who leave school early 
should have a course of study different from the course of those who 

1 Report of Committee of Fifteen on Elementary Education, p. 196. 

2 Ibid., p. 173. 

3 Ibid., p. 95. 

* Ibid., pp. 73-84. 



52 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

are to continue on into secondary and higher work, the committee was 
not able to agree. Some contended that those who leave early should 
have a more practical course, and that they should dispense with 
studies of a preparatory character, while others held that it was best 
to have one course in the elementary schools for all. This position 
was urged on the grounds that any school education is at best but an 
initiation into the art of learning, and that, wherever the pupil leaves 
off in his school course, he should continue his studies in the public 
library and at home; and, furthermore, that a brief course in higher 
studies, such as Latin and algebra, instead of being useless, is of more 
value than any elementary studies that might replace them.^ 

In its discussion of the question respecting the introduction of de- 
partmental work in the elementary school the committee, while not 
enthusiastic in its favor, went further than did the majority replying 
to the committee's questionnaire, and recommended that specializa- 
tion of the teacher's work should not be attempted before the seventh 
or eighth year, and then in not more than one or two studies.^ 

The third important study under the auspices of the National Ed- 
ucation i^ssociation during the nineties was made by the Committee 
on College Entrance Requirements, and bore directly on the articula- 
tion of the secondary division wdth that of higher education. This 
committee was appointed by the Department of Secondary Education 
in 1895, and submitted its final report at the Los Angeles meeting in 
1899. The committee consisted of five from the Department of Sec- 
ondary Education and five from the Department of Higher Educa- 
tion, increased at a later time by two :<^rom each department; and it 
called in for cooperation four committees of three each, appointed 
respectively from the New England Association of Colleges and Sec- 
ondary Schools, the Association of the Middle States and Maryland, 
the Southern Association, and the North Central Association. At 
a later date, the national committee called upon the Philological 
Association for a report on Latin and Greek; upon the American 
Historical Association to prepare a report on the scope and place of 
history in the secondary schools; upon the Modern Language Asso- 
ciation of America for a report on German and French, with model 
courses of study for secondary schools; and upon the American 
Mathematical Association for a report on the subjects in which it was 
interested.^ 

The report submitted by the committee is positive in general tone ; 
it expresses convictions rather than doubts. In respect to the length 

1 Report of the Committee of Fifteen, p. 87. 

aii)id., p. 05. 

3 Report of the Committee on College Entrance Requiroments, pp. .5-12. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION FIRST DECADE. 53 

of the elementary and secondary periods, the committee makes the 
following recommendation : 

In our opinion it is important tliat the last two grades that now precede the 
high-school course should be incorporated in it, and, wherever practicable, the 
instruction in those two grades should be given under the supervision of the 
high-school teacher.^ 

Again, concerning the high-school course, the committee recom- 
mended a six-year course, beginning wdth the seventh year, on the 
grounds that the seventh grade, rather than the ninth, is the natural 
turning point in the pupil's life ; that an easier transition can thereby 
be made from the one-teacher regimen to the system of special 
teachers; that a larger percentage of students would, through this 
arrangement, be retained in school; and that the final result would 
be a more closely articulated system, with a larger percentage of 
graduates from the high school.- 

On this plan the advisory committee on modern languages reported 
as follows : 

There appears to be strong argument in favor of this plan. It is urged by 
thoughtful schoolmen that our American high school has become congested ; 
that the increased requirements of the colleges and the pressing demands of 
new subjects for " recognition " have given to the secondary school more work 
than it can do thoroughly in the traditional allotment of time. When, as some- 
times happens, the colleges are blamed for this state of affairs, and it is sug- 
gested that they reduce their requirements for admission, they are able to reply 
with much force that present requirements, even where they are highest, are 
none too high, unless we are willing to fall far below the standard of the Old 
"World. The average graduate of an American high school is of about the same 
age as the average graduate of a German gymnasium, but the latter is further 
along in his studies and better prepared for higher work. We have therefore to 
consider the problem of strengthening the preparatory course, while recognizing 
that the ordinary four-year curriculum can bear no further burdens, and should, 
if anything, be simplified. Of this problem the obvious solution is to begin the 
proper work of the high school at an earlier date. Instead of dividing our 
educational years into eight primary, four secondary, and seven or eight higher, 
we should divide them into six primary, six secondary, and six higher.^ 

Regarding the function of the secondary school in relation to the 
college period the committee expresses its position clearly and forcibly 
in the semiofficial preliminary report of the chairman, Dr. A. F. 
Nightingale. He says : 

Throughout the course of secondary instruction, surely, there must be no 
Procrustean bed which every pupil by some process of dwarfing or stretching 
must be made to fit ; but natural endowments, as soon as discovered, should 
have full scope, within certain limitations. College courses ought to be so 
adjusted that every pupil at the end of a secondary course recognized as ex- 

1 Report of the Committee on College Entrance Requirements, p. 2^. 
- Ibid., pp. 30-32. 
° Ibid., p. 98. 



54 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

oellent, both in the quality ami quantity of its worli, may find the doors of 
every college swing wide to receive him into an atmosphere of deeper research 
and higher culture along the lines of his mental aptitudes.^ 

Again, Dr. Nightingale says : 

The public high school can become a link in the golden chain of our Amer- 
ican system of education only when the colleges begin where the best high 
schools leave off; otherwise the gap between the common school and the 
college must be filled by the private schools, patronized by the children of the 
rich, and the sons and daughters of the great middle class must be deprived of 
the benefits of a higher education, because, forsooth, they have failed to fulfill 
some specific requirement of the college they would otherwise enter. I have 
faith, however, that the conflicting requirements will be harmonized, their 
incongruities removed, so that we may in the near future have a unified system 
of education, from the kindergarten to the graduate school of the university, 
which will give to every child, without let or hindrance, the right of way for 
such an education as will best develop the power with which. In a plastic 
state, he has been endowed by the Infinite Architect.'' 

Besides the discussions carried on during this period, under the 
auspices of the various educational organizations, many individuals 
of prominence added materially to the growing interest which the 
movement aroused. Chief among these, in prestige and personal 
force, was Nicholas Murray Butler, president of Columbia Univer- 
sity, who very early in the decade energetically championed the 
cause, and through the press and from the platform unremittingly 
urged a functional reorganization of our school system. Near the 
end of the decade (1898), in a notable address relating to the scope 
and function of secondary education,^ President Butler, in seeking 
to define the scope of secondary education and its purpose, gave an 
illuminating characterization of both the elementary and secondary 
periods of school life. This characterization, in part, follows: 

Elementary education I define as that general training in the elements of 
knowledge that is suitable for a pupil from the age of 6 or 7 to the period of 
adolescence. It is ordinarily organized in eight or nine grades, each occupying 
an academic year. Nine grades are too many and are distinctly wasteful. To 
spend so much time on these simple studies leads to that arrested development 
which is so often the bane of the elementary school period. I have never known 
a child who needed more than six years' time in which to complete the ele- 
mentary course, and I have known but few who have, as an actual fact, ever 
taken longer than that. * * * 

The secondary school period is essentially the period of adolescence, of what 
may be called active adolescence as distinguished from the later and less vio- 
lent manifestations of physical and mental change that are now usually in- 
cluded under the term. The normal years are, with us, from 12 to 16, or from 
13 to 17. The normal boy or girl who is going to college ought to enter at 17 
at the latest. * * * it is in the elimination of elementary studies from the 

1 Report of the Committee on College Entrance Requirements, p. 7. 

3 Ibid., p. 8. 

3Educ. Rev., .Tune, 1898. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION FIRST DECADE. 55 

secondary school and the frank recognition of the paramount advantage of the 
elective system that I see the way of highest usefulness opening before the 
secondary school. 

This address by President Butler and the report of the Committee 
on College Entrance Requirements, with the debate which the posi- 
tive recommendations of the latter aroused, closed the first decade of 
the discussion looking toward a functional articulation of the parts 
of the school system. The searching analysis and keen criticism 
which the decade brought to bear on the Harvard proposals and the 
National Education Association's recommendations served to set 
in clearer light than ever before the several parts of our school sys- 
tem in respect to function and relationship. Inasmuch as the reports 
and recommendations dealt primarily with the field of secondary edu- 
cation, the discussions which these precipitated centered about the 
high school, and for the first time in the history of the rise of this 
distinctively American institution, we find a body of discussion 
directed to the internal economy of the high school, to its proper 
place as an institution in our school system, and to its relation to the 
social and civic needs of the people. Prior to the address of Presi- 
dent Eliot (1888), already cited, as marking, roughly, the begin- 
ning of this period of sharp examination to which the school system 
was subjected, the high school was almost wholly occupied with a 
struggle for existence. In every community the fight between the 
progressive and the conservative forces, in respect to supplying at 
public expense an education of secondary grade, was keen, and in 
many communities a long and bitter contest was waged before the 
high-school idea was generally accepted. Even as late as the early 
eighties the educational literature dealing with the high school is 
filled with discussions relating to the question, whether or not the 
high school, as an institution, should be supported by public tax. 
By 1888, however, the fight was won, and the question of the right 
of these schools to exist at all had pretty nearly disappeared from 
view.^ Self-preservation had ceased to become the all-absorbing 
issue and, in consequence, the proponents of the high school could 
turn from an attitude of defense to one of constructive criticism. 
President Eliot's proposal to shorten and enrich our school courses, 
^vnd the illuminating suggestions contained in the reports of the com- 
mittees working under the auspices of the National Education 
Association, therefore, served to accelerate the process of adjustment 
and of reconstruction from which our high school has not yet 
emerged. 

iThurber, Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1887, p. 428. 



Chapter IV. 

EFFORTS TOWARD A FUNCTIONAL REORQANIZATION- 
THE SECOND DECADE OF THE DISCUSSION. 



Contents. — The Chicago University conferences ; Dewey's paper ; Harper's proposals ; 
the report of the commission of twenty-one — The discussion of the Kansas City 
plan — The report of the committee on the culture element and economy of time in 
education — The reports of the standing committees on the division of time between 
the elementary and secondary periods — The report of the committee of nine — The 
new Harvard plan for college admission — The new Chicago plan for college admis- 
sion — The report of the committee of the High School Teachers' Association of New 
York City — The investigations by the New York and Brooklyn teachers' associa- 
tion — The report of the Lange committee to the California council of education — 
Summary of the second decade of the discussion. 



Early in the second decade of the movement toward a functional 
reorganization the University of Chicago and the academies and high 
schools affiliating and cooperating with this institution took it up, 
and through the initiative and personal force of President Harper 
the discussion was carried on with great vigor. At the general ses- 
sion of the fifteenth conference, held during November, 1901, Prof. 
John Dewey read a paper on " Current Problems in Secondary Edu- 
cation," in which he declared that among the problems of first im- 
portance were those relating to the articulation of the secondary 
school in the educational system. In this address he pointed out 
that the elementary school and the college represent distinctly differ- 
ent forces and traditions, historically ; that the one was created by a 
broad democratic movement, while the other is a response to the 
desire to pass on to a privileged class the wisdom and enlightenment 
of the past ; and that the high school is the product of the meeting of 
these two forces, and upon it, more than upon any other part of the 
school system, rests the responsibility of making an adjustment.^ 

The year following (1902) the conference discussed reorganizing 
the system of education on the basis of an elementary school of six 
grades, followed by a secondary school of six grades. The discussion 
was summed up by President Harper in the following form:^ 

A Proposition. 

1. To connect the work of the eighth grade of the elementary school with that 
of the secondary school. 

iFor paper in full, see Sch. Rev. (1902), vol. 10, pp. 13-28. 

-'Sell. Rev., vol. 11 (l!»O.Si. pp. 1-3. 
56 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 57 

2. To exteucl the work of the secondary school to include the first two years 
of college work. 

3. To reduce the work of the seven years thus grouped together to six years. 

4. To make it possible for the best class of students to do the work in five 
years. 

Such a plan would fit in with — 

1. The necessity, so wid'ely recognized, of lifting the standard for admission 
to the professional schools. 

2. The general feeling that in some way or other time must be saved in the 
preliminary stages of educational work in order that men and women may 
enter upon their life work at an earlier age. 

3. The practice, recognized in other countries, of drawing a sharp line be- 
tween the work of the gymnasium or lycee and that of the university. 

4. The practice, now in common vogue, of making the first two years of 
college work only an extension of the work in the secondary school. 

5. The contention, which seems to be well founded, that much of the second- 
ary work of to-day was college work 30 years ago. 

6. The tendency already manifesting itself in some quarters in accordance 
with which high schools are offering postgraduate work and universities are 
accepting this work in lieu of the work of the first two years. 

7. The principle that the line of separation at the close of the second college 
year is much more clearly marked, pedagogically, than the line at the close of 
the present high-school period. 

8. The tendency, everywhere apparent, to extend the scope of the educational 
work offered by the State or municipality. 

9. The tendency, already beginning to be noticed among smaller colleges, to 
limit the work offered to that of the preparatory school and the first two years 
of college. 

10. The opinion, not infrequently expressed, that the work of the eighth 
grade is in some measure superfluous for certain classes of pupils and in somfe 
measure injurious to certain other classes. 

11. The belief, more and more generally accepted, that the work of the school 
must be adapted to the neetls and possibilities of the individual pupil, rather 
than that pupils should be treated in mass. 

12. The principle that a pupil giving evidence of ability to do the highest 
grade of work may profitably be excused from doing the same amount of work 
required of the pupil of lower grade. 

In opposition to such a plan there may be suggested : 

1. The inclination to regard any system actually in use as better than a 
system or policy still to be tested. 

2. The feeling that the reduction of time can be gained only by a loss of 
thoroughness. 

3. The general lack of interest in any proposition to substitute a well-ordered 
educational system for the present lack of system. 

4. The difficulties involved in adjusting the lower work to the higher, on the 
ground that the great mass of pupils receive only the lower, and that the public- 
school system is intended primarily for them. 

5. The belief that the State has already gone too far in providing public edu- 
cation of a high character. 

6. The opinion that the present college policy, although it is the result of a 
gradual development, has now reached a position which it must always occupy. 



58 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

7. The fear that tlie college idea would be Injured by tlie rivalry of the 
new high-school colleges. 

8. The desire to see specialism begin at a very early age. 

9. The hesitation with which many would regard the transfer of the eightli 
grade from the realm of elementary to that of secondary work. 

10. The failure, even in these times, to accept the doctrine of individualism in 
the field of pedagogical work. 

This report closed with a recommendation that the conference 
establish three committees of seven each to consider the general prob- 
lem; the first committee, from the point of view of the elementary 
work; the second, from the point of view of the secondary school; 
and the third, from the point of view of the college; these three 
committees to form a joint committee of 21. The conclusions reached 
by these committees were received by the general conference during 
its seventeenth annual session, November, 1903. 

The committee on elementary schools reported that there were 
reasons outside those resulting from a desire to adjust the curriculum 
to the college which make the shortening of the course of the ele- 
mentary school to seven years desirable.^ In this connection the com- 
mittee submitted the following: («)That the possibility of finishing 
the elementary school in less than the traditional eight-year period 
might induce many who would otherwise leave school to finish the 
entire course; (h) that the necessary condensation of work due to the 
adoption of the seven-year course would be beneficial, forcing, as it 
would, an elimination of nonessential matter; (c) that inasmuch as 
experience has shown better results to have been secured where the 
eighth grades are congregated at central points and taught by 
teachers who have specialized in their training, the advisability of 
limiting elementary school work to seven years and combining eighth- 
grade classes with the high school is suggested; and (d) that taking 
the eighth grade into the high school will still further increase the 
elevating influence which the high school is exerting on the ele- 
mentary school. 

The committee, in discussing the further question whether or not 
such a change is feasible, referred to the satisfactory experience of 
Kansas City, Mo., which for a number of years has had a seven-year 
elementary course, and urged that the shortening of the course should 
be effected, not by the transfer of the studies of the last year to the 
high school, but by the sifting of the present work of the elementary 
schools and its redistribution over seven years. 

The committee on secondary schools reported in favor of the gen- 
eral proposition to shorten the school course,^ on the ground that such 
an arrangement Avould tide the pupil over the period of adolescence, 

1 For the report of the committee in full, see Sch, Rev., vol. 12 (1904), pp. l.j-10. 

2 Ibid., pp. 19-22. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 59 

when he tends to think his education completed, and when, under our 
present arrangement, he is tempted to leave school on the assumption 
that he no longer needs it ; and that extending the high-school course 
upward would give an opportunity for a more extended education to 
many who, were they forced to leave their home town, would be 
unable to afford it. 

The committee on colleges reported that the advantages accruing 
to the people were of such character and such magnitude as to war- 
rant the adoption of the plan suggested. In this report the commit- 
tee gave consideration in some detail to the unfavorable comments on 
the plan made by the presidents of several of the colleges with whom 
the committee was in correspondence.^ 

The foregoing reports were referred back to the three committees, 
sitting as a body, and known as the Commission of Twenty-One, 
President Harper, chairman. This commission was instructed to 
report a year later at the eighteenth annual conference, to be held 
in November, 1904. At the appointed time the report, which fol- 
lows, was submitted : ^ 

Your commission finds, as a result of their study of tlie subject connected 
with these propositions, that among other questions the following require to be 
investigated, namely: 

1. Is the present policy of differentiation between the elementary and second- 
ary schools desirable ; or, should an effort be made toward greater unification 
in method and organization? 

2. Should the elementary school correspond to the period of childhood, and 
therefore should it provide for six years of school work from the ages of 6 to 12 
years, instead of eight years as at present? 

3. Should the secondary school correspond to the period of youth, and should 
it therefore provide for six years of school work from the ages of 13 to 18, 
instead of four years as at present? 

4. What revision of the curricula of the elementary and secondary schools 
and what changes in methods of teaching can be made that will contribute to 
economy of time and eflBciency of work? 

5. In order to secure a well-balanced development and at the same time to 
contribute to the economy of time, can the school year be lengthened advan- 
tageously and minor vacations be more equally distributed? 

6. Under what limitations should high schools undertake to do the v^^ork of 
the first two college years? 

The committee recommended that a new commission of 15 persons 
be appointed to carry on the investigation of these questions, the 
report of the same to constitute, in part, the basis of the nineteenth 
educational conference, to be held November, 1905. 

While the report of the Commission of Twenty-One received atten- 
tion, the chief topic of interest before this eighteenth conference 
was that of the upward extension of the high school to include the 

1 For the report of the committee in full, see Sch. Rev., vol. 12 (1904), pp. 22-25, 

2 See report, Sch. Rev., vol. 12 (1905), pp. 23-25. 

5930°— 16 5 



60 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

first two years of college work.^ This topic had been discussed at 
both the sixteenth (1902)2 ^j^^j seventeenth (1903)^ conferences, in 
the form, originally, of a proposal to add to the present four' years' 
course in the high school two years of college work from above and 
one year of elementary work from below, and to reduce the seven 
years thus grouped together to a period of six years.* Very early 
the discussion assumed that two years were to be added from below, 
making a secondary period of eight years which was to be condensed 
to six years.^ In the discussion held during the eighteenth confer- 
ence, however, the question turned not on the idea of condensing a 
seven or eight year secondary period, but rather on the conditions 
that would justify the high schools in undertaking to do the first 
two years of college work in addition to their regular four years' 
course, and on the basis on which the colleges would credit the work 
thus given. In this connection Supt. J. Stanley Brown asserted that 
the idea was being practically carried into effect in different sections 
of the country and in different ways and in varying degrees. He 
cited Philadelphia, Pa., Muskegon, Mich., Saginaw, Mich., St. Jo- 
seph, Mo., Goshen, Ind., and Joliet, 111., as examples,^ and stated that 
in each instance the extended secondary school had come about in 
response to demands from parents who could not afford to send 
their children to distant points for advanced schooling. 

This examination of the various proposals suggested for shortening 
the course of study, carried on by the schools in relation with the 
University of Chicago, was influenced by the knowledge that since 
18G7 the elementary schools of Kansas City, Mo., have been organ- 
ized on a seven-year basis, and that the arrangement was reported to 
be entirely satisfactory.'' The interest which these discussions aroused 
centered attention for a time upon the Kansas City plan. The Na- 
tional Education Association, through its Department of Superin- 
tendence, responded to this general interest in 1903 by inviting James 
M. Greenwood, superintendent of the Kansas City schools, to de- 
scribe the plan at the Cincinnati meeting. 

In his address Supt. Greenwood contended that all the essentials 
of an eight years' course can be compressed into seven years; that 
Kansas City had never found it necessary to change to eight years 

iSee Sch. Rev., vol. 13 (1905), p. 14. 

2 Ibid., vol. 11 (1903), pp. 1-20. 

3 Ibid., vol. 12, pp. 15-28. 

* See proposals by Harper, The High School of the Future, Sch. Rev., vol. 11 (1903), 
p. 1. 

5 See statement of the plan, Soldau, Sthorteniny the Years of Elementary BchooUng, 
Sch. Rev., vol. 11 (1903), p. 6. 

* See condensed statement by B^o^\'n, Present Development of Secondary Schools 
According to the Proposed Plan, Sch. Rev., vol. 13 (1905), pp. 15-18. 

'' See the reference to the Kansas City plan made by the Committee on Elementary 
Schools, mentioned on p. 58 and found in Sch. Rev., vol. 12 (1904), pp. 15-19. 



EFFOETS TOWAED REOEGANIZATIOlSr SECOND DECADE. 61 

in order to cover the required work; that the mean average age of 
a class completing a ward-school course was a false standard by which 
to judge of the time in which a pupil should cover the work; and 
that such an arrangement materially increased the percentage of en- 
rollment in the high school.^ This address brought out vigorous dis- 
cussion, but no steps were taken at the time by other cities toward 
putting the Kansas City plan into more extended effect. 

Beyond the discussion of Supt. Greenwood's address, the Depart- 
ment of Superintendence of the National Education Association 
has taken, during the past decade, little or no part in the discussions 
of this general problem of articulating the parts of our school system. 
On the other hand, the interest taken by the National Council of 
Education and the Department of Secondary Education during the 
first decade of the discussion continued unabated during the second 
half of the period, though the results have not been as noteworthy. 
Each of these departments appointed committees to carry on inves- 
tigations, which, as the details worked out, came to cover essentially 
the same field. 

The first of these investigations was started by the council in 
1903, when, upon the suggestion of President Baker, a committee 
was appointed to report upon the desirability of an investigation of 
The Culture Element and Economy of Time in Education. In 
1905 the committee recommended that the council appoint a com- 
mittee of five persons, partly college men and partly school men, 
to prepare a report on the following topics: (1) The best period for 
the high school, whether four years, from 14 to 18, or six years, from 
12 to 18; and (2) the devices already in use for shortening the col- 
lege course, or the combined courses of college and professional 
school.^ Nothing immediate came of the proposal, but at the 1907 
meeting of the council the suggestions were revived through a report 
by the committee on investigations and appropriations to the effect 
that the board of directors appropriate the sum of $500 to make a 
"preliminary inquiry into the contemporary judgment as to the 
culture element in education, and the time that should be devoted 
to the combined school and college course," and that a committee of 
five be appointed to make a report on the same.^ President Baker 
was asked to prepare a preliminary report upon the desirability of 
making the suggested investigation ; which report was presented by 
him before the council at the Cleveland meeting in 1908,* 

^ For address in full, see Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1903, pp. 247-260 ; also in Education, vol. 
23, pp. 455-466; 538-545. 

3 For report of committee, see Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1905, pp. 55, 56. 
3 See Nat. Educ Assoc, 1907, pp. 48, 49. 
* Ibid., 1908, pp. 466-478. 



62 EEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

In preparing his report, President Baker sent to certain men, 
carefully selected from every field of education, an inquiry embrac- 
ing such questions as the following : 

At what age should formal general and special education end, as normally 
marked out for attaining a professional degree or the Ph. D. degree? If the 
entire period of genei'al and special education should be shortened, where should 
time be saved? Is there important waste of time in elementary education? 
Should the period of elementary education be shortened? Where and how? 
Should the high-school period be shortened or should it be extended in either 
direction? What should be the length of the college course? How does the 
whole problem of culture and time elements in education relate itself to the 
demands of business and society to-day or to the ideals of our civilization? 

In discussing the replies to his questionnaire, President Baker 

said, in part : 

The first impression is that there is a real and widespread dissatisfaction 
with the results of education, especially as related to the time expended ; that 
there is a growing consciousness of the need of adjustment to new ideals ; that 
there is a demand for reinvestigation and reorganization. The people are ready 
for the leadership of any representative body that will attempt to reduce to 
some degree of order educational theories, methods, and standards. It is a 
surprise to me to learn that two-thirds of the correspondents believe the period 
of formal education should be shortened, and that very many would place the 
age limit at 24 or earlier. All ask for a shorter limit or better results for 
the time, or both. They recognize that since the early New England college, 
education has added eight years, the high school has taken the place of the 
college, four years have been set apart for the higher degrees ; that the college 
to-day occupies an anomalous position, without a well-defined function; that 
each unit of the system is yearly increasing its demands; that quantity is the 
ideal rather than quality. There is a disposition to call a halt along all the 
line and have an inspection. 

President Baker, furthermore, pointed out that the opinion that 
much time is wasted in elementary education is nearly unanimous; 
that a large majority claim that the elementary period should be 
shortened; that a majority favor a high-school period of six years, 
extending from the age of 12 to the age of 18; and that one-half of 
the correspondents would have university work begin at the junior 
year, with groups leading to various professional degrees, and would 
complete the professional work, or Ph. D. work, in two years more, 
or six years after college entrance. In conclusion, he recommended 
that the council should proceed with its proposed investigation 
through a committee representing elementary education, the sec- 
ondary, the collegiate and university, the field of social science, and 
the science of education; and that this committee should cooperate 
with any other national organization pursuing similar inquiries, 
formulate results, and unite in a final report, with practical recom- 
mendations.^ 

1 For preliminary report, together with a condensed summary of replies to the ques- 
tionnaire, see Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1908, pp. 466-478. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 63 

The recommendation respecting the desirability of continuing the 
investigation was approved by the council, which increased the com- 
mittee to five, retaining President Baker as chairman. In 1909, at 
the Denver, Colo., meeting, the chairman presented a brief report, 
covering the steps which the committee was taking in pursuing its 
investigation and stating the thesis of the committee to be "that in 
the entire period of general education two years can be saved with- 
out loss of anything essential in culture, efficiency, or character 
making, this thesis to be proved or disproved." In this report Presi- 
dent Baker also sketched the line of inquiry pursued by the com- 
mittee respecting the college, which a number of correspondents had 
recommended to the committee the year before and which follows : 

1. To end college work with the sophomore year, but allow four years, as now, 
for the A. B. degree. 

2. To let university work begin at the junior year, with groups leading to the 
various professional degrees or the Ph. D. degree, the last two years of college 
counting toward these degrees. 

3. To require two years of college for admission to all professional schools. 

4. To complete the professional work, or Ph. D. work, in two years more, or 
six years after college entrance. 

5. To let the college do the first two years of the professional work, instead 
of allowing the professional school, as now, in many cases, to do the last two 
years of college work. 

6. To consider the possibility of advantageously building the engineering 
school upon the first two years of college.^ 

In connection with the foregoing report by the chairman, a member 
of the committee, William H. Smiley, principal of East Side High 
School, Denver, Colo., submitted a brief discussion of the progress 
of an investigation in the field of secondary education.^ He stated 
that the consensus of opinion is that time can be saved, both in the 
elementary and in the high school. He referred to the division of 
time suggested by Principal Armstrong, of the Englewood High 
School of Chicago, who would divide the periods on the basis of 
function, having four typical schools : The play type, or kindergarten, 
from 5 to 7; the motor type, or elementary school, from 7 to 12; 
the intermediate type, from 12 to 14 ; and the secondary-school type, 
from 14 to 18 years. He quoted Mr. Armstrong's comments on his 
suggested intermediate type of school: 

Children at 12 to 14 should be isolated from the younger and from the more 
mature pupils in order to accord them proper environment for their peculiar 
condition. I believe this can be done in all our city schools by creating an in- 
termediate school that would include the eighth grade and the first year of 
high school. I would not have them taught in separate buildings remote from 
the other sex, for then the social influence would be lost. 

1 For report, see Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1909, pp. 373-376. 

2 For the supplementary report, see Nat. Educ. Assoc, 1909, pp. 377-380. 



64 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

In respect to the function of the high school Mr. Smiley quoted at 
Bome length from a communication by Prof. Alexis F. Lange, of the 
University of California, who said, in part: 

The question is no longer, Shall the high school live unto itself ; but, How shall 
it live with its neighbors on either side? Of what sort must the interschool 
railway be that all may travel for their health, some to the end, others to inter- 
mediate terminals, always with stop-over privileges? Education must become 
more continuous, not mechanically, but organically. The 16 or more grades of 
our school system must come to stand approximately for as many adaptations 
to unbroken growth. The educational edifice erected by the nineteenth century 
still resembles too closely an irregular pyramid of three boxes, the tops and bot- 
toms of which are perforated in order that the more acrobatic pupils may vault 
from the known to the unknown, and their teachers above and below may ex- 
change maledictions. The twentieth century can not accept this arrangement 
as final. The structure, as seen from the outside, may well remain intact ; but 
the provisional tops and bottoms inside must be refitted, if not removed. Now, 
one essential in preparing for this task is to realize that adolescence begins at 
least two years earlier and ends about two years later than the inherited acci- 
dental high-school period. Divested of artificial meanings, secondary education 
is seen to cover not less than eight grades, instead of four. Another essential is, 
of course, to act on this insight. A high-school section is a physiological anach- 
ronism until its circumference is extended to include teachers of the upper 
grammar and of the first two college grades. 

No further report was made by this committee beyond the state- 
ment at the Boston meeting, 1910, that progress was being made, 
until the San Francisco meeting, 1911, when President Baker pre- 
sented the conclusions which he himself had reached. These will be 
found in full in the proceedings of the association, under the caption. 
The Reorganization of American Education.^ The time scheme 
which he recommended therein follows: 

Age in years. 

Elementary education 6-12 

Secondary education (two divisions — four years and two years) 12-18 

College 18-20 

or 16-20 
University (graduate school and professional schools) 20-24 

In the discussion of this grouping President Baker wrote : ^ 

The tools of education can be acquired at the age of 12, and there are reasons 
■why high-school methods should begin at about that age, when so many pupils 
leave the elementary schools. The division of the secondary period into four 
years and two years lends itself to the plan for industrial education, as will be 
seen later. Moreover, smaller high schools can end at 16; larger high schools 
at 18 and 20. Small colleges can take pupils from 16 to 20, thus maintaining a 
four-year course. The universities can retain two years — namely, from 18 to 20. 

Let us see what are the essential consequences of this time scheme in terms 
of pedagogy. Many processes of mental training are easier in the earlier years. 
Beginning high-school methods at 12 will meet the need of pupils who at that 

1 Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1911, pp. 94-103. 

3 For the complete report of the committee, see Educ. Bull., 191.3, No. 38, Economy of 
Time in Education. 



EFFOETS TOWARD EEOEGANlZATlON SECOND DECADE. 65 

age are restless and are seeking larger and more varied interests. Twenty is a 
better age to be^in genuine university work than later, when the mind is less 
elastic, energetic, and adaptable. Elimination of useless material will stimulate 
the interest of pupils and result in harder and better effort ; the time would be 
filled with important work. It lessens the period of work that to the pupil 
appears void of purpose. It makes a better division of time between receptive 
study and the larger motor activities. 

Moreover, we must consider results, in view of the just claims of our civiliza- 
tion to-day. Educational aims must be adapted to civic needs. The history of 
education shows that it has always been closely related to the dominant needs 
and ideals of the people at any given period. There is no doubt about the public 
attitude to-day. The schools will be compelled so to reorganize as to meet them 
in the most efficient way. The proposed time scheme makes a better economic 
division between preparation for life and active life. It enables men to become 
established in life earlier and to give more of their best years to social service. 
It will keep a larger number in school through the elementary and preparatory 
period. It will eliminate waste and foolishness, and thus make more serious 
and efficient citizens. By introducing earlier the methods that produce power, 
and by selection of the fittest, the proposed reorganization of college and univer- 
sity will enhance the intellectual strength of the Nation. 

Under the auspices of the Department of Secondary Education, 
during the second decade of the discussion, two valuable contribu- 
tions were made, the one dealing with the relation of the elementary' 
and secondary periods, and the other considering in particular the 
articulation of the high school and college. 

The first of these grew out of a paper by Dr. E. W. Lyttle, State 
inspector of high schools for New York, on the subject, " Should the 
Twelve- Year Course of Study be Equally Divided Between the 
Elementary School and the Secondary?"^ This led, in 1905, to the 
appointment of a standing committee to consider the question of 
dividing the 12 years equally between elementary and secondary 
schools. Dr. Lyttle advocated, in the paper just referred to, such a 
division, on the grounds that the eight-year grade course is the re- 
sult of a desire to attain "perfection in the fundamentals"; that 
there is a pedagogical point where secondary education should begin, 
which occurs when the child has acquired the tools of an education, 
and at a point coinciding with the dawn of adolescence; that this 
period is characterized by a marked mental change, which should be 
recognized in both the content and method of instruction ; and that a 
six-year high-school course would lend itself in the eleventh and 
twelfth grades to a differentiation along lines of business, mechanical 
arts, and professional preparation. 

The standing committee reported in 1907, at the Los Angeles (Cal.) 
meeting, that the trend of competent opinion strongly favored a six 

^ See paper in full, in Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1905, pp. 428-436. 



66 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

and six division, and enumerated reasons for an equal division.^ A 
summary of the reasons advanced follows : 

1. The plan would give the pupils the advantage of teachers specially trained 
for the different branches, securing thereby better teaching, because the teacher 
does the work for which he is best fitted and for which he has made special 
preparation. 

2. The plan makes possible the extension of departmental work into the 
seventh and eighth grades, which is desirable, because it gives the children 
daily contact with several personalities instead of that all-day association with 
one teacher, which often breeds an artificial psychic atmosphere that savors of 
the abnormal. 

3. It would give the pupils laboratories in which elementary science might 
be begun earlier than at present. 

4. If the upper-grade pupils were in the high school, the manual training 
shops could be employed to start them in their work without scattering the 
pupils among the schools in various parts of the city. 

5. The work in the modern languages could thereby be begun earlier and 
continued longer than at present, making it possible to learn the language con- 
versationally and naturally. 

6. It would check the loss of pupils due to the abruptness of the transition 
from the elementary to the high school. 

7. It would cause more pupils to enter the ninth grade than under the 
present plan, as it would remove the notion held by parents that the eighth 
year is the natural stopping place. 

8. In comparison with the schools of Germany and England, which intro- 
duce secondary subjects earlier, we are losing two years of valuable time. 

9. It would give the pupil more time and leisure to prepare for college, hence 
the preparation would be more thorough. 

10. The addition of two years to the high school would give the leisure neces- 
sary to normal growth, and would tend to solve the problem of crowded 
curriculum. 

Against these advantages the committee pointed out that lengthen- 
ing the high-school course would call for a greater proportion of 
liigh schools, and, as high-school maintenance cost is greater than 
that of elementary schools, the tax rate of a given locality would 
be somewhat increased. 

The standing committee next reported at the Cleveland meeting, 
1908.- 

In the report submitted the chairman sketched the progress of the 
discussion held by the Department of Secondary Education in the 
following words: 

In 1893 the Committee of Ten, representing subcommittees of 90, chosen for 
the most part from secondary and higher institutions, presented its report on 
secondary-school studies. 

So far, at least, as public high schools were concerned, that report was val- 
uable mainly as establishing ideals, and ideals only for those subjects then 
deemed acceptable for college preparation. From this report we quote one 
sentence : 

Anyone who reads these nine reports consecutively will be struck with the 
fact that all these bodies of experts desire to have the elements of their several 
subjects taught earlier than they now are. 

1 For report in full, see Nat. Ed. .\ssoc., 1907, pp. 705-710. 

2 n)id., 1908, pp. 025-628. 



EPFOETS TOWAED REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 67 

Eleven years later, at tlie St. Louis Exposition, it became painfully evident 
that the United States was almost the only considerable civilized nation that 
prolonged its system of elementary education to eight or nine years. 

Since 1900 two of the most progressive nations of the world, France and 
Japan, have revised their national programs, and both have virtually limited the 
term of elementary study to six years. 

In 1905, at a meeting of the secondary department of the National Education 
Association, held at Asbury Park, it was voted to appoint a standing committee 
on six-year courses of high-school study, of which committee Gilbert B. Mor- 
rison, principal of the William McKinley High School, St. Louis, was chairman. 

It is well to note that within the present year Mr. J, Edward Swanstrom, for 
some time president of the Board of Education in Brooklyn, and later a member 
of the Board of Education of Greater New York, published in the Brooklyn 
Eagle an argument for the adoption of the six-year course of elementary study, 
to be followed by three years of work In the lower high schools, plus three 
years in the upper grade, or specialized high schools. In that article Mr. Swan- 
strom argues forcibly that his plan would not only increase the educational 
efficiency of the schools, but would be highly economical for the city of Greater 
New York. 

At least 10 cities in the United States have, for several years, employed the 
proposed six-year division and believe it to be more economical. 

Working along the lines indicated by growing educational opinion, your pres- 
ent committee has decided as follows: 

1. To outline what may reasonably be required of pupils at the end of the 
sixth school year as essential to a preparation for high-school work. 

2. Suggest for the seventh and eighth grades a minimum practicable course 
of study based on the experience and practice of the civilized world, to consume 
perhaps 70 per cent of the pupils' time, and to advise, for the other 30 per cent, 
those electives which the best pedagogical thought and practice approve. 

3. To recommend further careful investigation in regard to fixing points for 
vocational differentiation in accordance with local conditions and individual 
characteristics. 

4. To recommend that promotions be by units of work accomplished rather 
than by years, thereby permitting the shortening or the lengthening of the time 
in which the course, nominally of six years, may be completed by pupils of 
varying ability. 

There follows, in the report of the committee, a detailed outline 
of what should be expected of pupils at the end of the sixth school 
year, and a list of studies for pupils of the seventh and eighth grades. 

The third report of the committee/ presented at Denver, Colo., 
in 1909, said: 

1. The committee, in reporting progress, wishes to express a further indorse- 
ment of the leading points and suggestions of preceding committees on six- 
year courses. 

2. The sentiment for the six and six division is growing. By an extensive 
correspondence through private and circular letters we note that there is a' 
freedom of discussion and a hospitality in the entertainment of the idea of a 
new division of the 12 years in the public schools not noticed in the former 
correspondence. Almost everyone who has given any expression seems to 

1 For the report in full see Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1909, pp. 498-503. 



68 EEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

believe iu some departure from tlie eight and four division, and several cities 
report these departures. In some cities six-year courses in the high school 
have been in vogue for several years. 

The committee further referred to an inquiry made during the 
year by the New York and Brooklyn teachers' associations and 
directed toward determining the length of elementary-school courses 
in the United States, the basis on which promotions are made, to 
what extent departmental teaching is employed therein, the propor- 
tion of college graduates among the teachers of the seventh and 
eighth grades, and whether or not grouping the ninth grade with 
the seventh and eighth grades is favored. 

The committee, in concluding its report, said : 

Thei'e is a general impression revealed by the correspondence that the whole 
course of instruction, both elementally and secondary, should be simplified ; 
that the differentiation of pupils' woi'k should begin at the end of the sixth 
grade; that time is wasted on nonessentials and on impractical topics; that 
there should be greater flexibility in the promotion of pupils ; that the whole 
system should be reorganized. 

A study of the schools of Great Britain and Germany within the past year 
discloses that differentiation begins in both countries at the point corresponding 
to the end of our sixth grade ; that the elements of the "higher " mathematics, 
of science, and the study of the foreign languages are begun at that point, and 
in many of the best schools even earlier ; that the secondary period is sis to 
eight years in length ; that in the best schools in Great Britain, notably those of 
Birmingham and Leeds, work corresponding to the high schools of this country 
is completed at about the age of 16. 

The committee is of the opinion that while we may not expect or hope for 
any sudden or extensive change iu the general scheme of organization from the 
eight and four year division to the six and six division, nevertheless we feel 
certain not only that the change is inevitable, but that it is already in progress 
and is taking place in different ways to meet local conditions. We further be- 
lieve that the reorganization of the public-school system along the lines of this 
discussion is of fundamental importance, and that every reasonable measure 
that can be taken to overcome the inertia of the established system and to 
make for an organization more in consonance with advanced educational opin- 
ions and with the needs of modem society should be employed. The problem 
involves not only division by years, but a well-digested curriculum of both the 
elementary and secondary branches. This curriculum should (a) provide the 
content of the work, including vocational studies; (ft) establish the points of 
differentiation; (c) consider methods of teaching and plans for promotion of 
pupils. 

The second of the studies undertaken by the Department of Sec- 
ondary Education related especially to high school and college. 
This study grew out of resolutions, adopted at the Boston, Mass., 
meeting, 1910, which requested the colleges to discontinue the en- 
trance requirement of two foreign languages and to recognize as 
electives all subjects well taught in the high school. The resolutions, 
furthermore, declared that, until such modification was made by the 
colleges, the high schools would be greatly hampered in their attempts 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION — SECOND DECADE. 69 

to serve the best interests of the boys and girls.^ The discussion of the 
resolutions led to the appointment of a committee of nine to prepare a 
statement of the work that the high school should do. The report of 
the committee, presented at the San Francisco meeting in 1911, is the 
most notable contribution to the discussion which has been made 
during the second decade of the movement.^ In small compass it 
expresses the highest point reached in the discussion of the func- 
tional articulation of the upper divisions of the public-school system. 
It may be looked upon as a summary of the best recent thought on 
the relation of the high school and college. The tenor of this report 
is clearly indicated in the first of the three chief divisions into which 
the report is divided and which we quote : 

SOME PBELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS ON THE FIELD AND FUNCTION OF EDUCATION IN 

THE HIGH SCHOOL. 

1. Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, in his annual report as president of the Carnegie 
Foundation, finds that American education, from elementary school to college, is 
suffering from the attempt to teach too many subjects to the same student at the 
same time. He believes that students taking the newer subjects should not be 
required to carry all the older subjects. He asserts emphatically that this is no 
argument against the enriched curriculum of the high school, but that, on the 
contrary, the high school must enrich still further its curriculum, and that it is 
the duty of the college to adjust itself to the high school thus broadened. 

2. It is the duty of the tax-supported high school to give every student instruc- 
tion carefully designed to return to society intelligent, able-bodied, and progres- 
sive citizens. To this end cei'tain -work should be included in the course of 
every student, whether he contemplates entering a higher institution or not. 
The responsibility of the high school in this matter can not be delegated to the 
college, because there is no guaranty that the particular student will actually 
go to college. 

3. It is coming to be recognized that in a democratic society the high school 
has a distinct function. The high-school period is the testing time, the time for 
trying out different powers, the time for forming life purposes. Consequently 
the opportunity should be provided for the student to test his capacity in a 
fairly large number of relatively diverse kinds of work. 

In the high school the boy (or girl) may very properly make a start along the 
line of his chosen vocation, but a final choice should not be forced upon him at 
the beginning of that career. If he makes a provisional choice early in the 
course there should be ample opportunity for readjustment later in the high 
school. For this reason the requirement of four years of work in any particular 
subject, as a condition of admission to a higher institution, unless that subject 
be one that may properly be required of all high-school students, is illogical and 
should, in the judgment of the committee, be immediately discontinued. 

4. Not only is it the duty of the high school to lay the foundation of good 
citizenship and to help in the wise choice of a vocation, but it is equally im- 
portant that the high school should make specific contribution to the efiiciency 
of the individual along various broad lines. In our industrial democracy the 
development of individual aptitudes and unique gifts is quite as important as 

1 For resolutions in full see Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1910, p. 443. 

2 For the report in full see Nat. Ed. Assoc, 1911, pp. 559-567. 



70 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

the development of the common elements of culture. Moreover, hard work Is to 
be secured not by insistence upon uniformity of tastes and interests, but by the 
encouragement of special effort along lines that appeal to the individual. Our 
education would gain in power and in virility if we made more of the dominant 
interest that each boy and girl has at the time. It would seem that some have 
come to believe the oft-repeated statement that the liberal should precede the 
vocational, but an organic conception of education demands the early introduc- 
tion of training for individual usefulness, thereby blending the liberal and the 
vocational, for only then does the liberal receive its social significance and 
importance. In other words, the boy who pursues both the liberal and the 
vocational sees the relation of his own work to the work of others and to the 
welfare of society, whereas the liberal without the vocational leaves him a mere 
spectator in the theater of life, and the boxes in this theater are already over- 
crowded. 

5. Mechanic arts, agriculture, or household science should be recognized as 
rational elements in the education of all boys and girls, and esi:)ecially of those 
who have not as yet chosen their vocation. Under the authority of the tradi- 
tional conception of the best preparation for a higher institution, many of our 
public high schools are to-day responsible for leading tens of thousands of boys 
and girls away from the pursuits for which they are adapted and in which 
they are needed to other pursuits for which they are not adapted and in which 
they are not needed. By means of exclusively bookish curricula false ideals 
of culture are developed. A chasm is created between the producers of mate- 
rial wealth and the distributors and consumers thereof. 

The high school should in a real sense reflect the major industries of the 
community which supports it. The high school, as the local educational insti- 
tution, should reveal to boys and girls the higher possibilities for more efiicieut 
service along the lines in which their own community is industrially organized. 

Our traditional ideals of preparation for higher institutions are practically 
incongruous with the actual needs and future responsibilities of girls. It would 
seem that such high-school work as is carefully designed to develop capacity 
for and interest in the proper management and conduct of a home should be 
regarded as of importance at least equal to that of any other work. We do not 
understand how society can properly continue to sanction high-school curricula 
for girls which disregard this fundamental need, even though such curricula are 
planned in response to the demand made by some of the colleges for women. 

In addition to the report of the Committee of Nine on the articu- 
lation of high school and college, it should be noted that at the same 
meeting and before the same department there were presented two 
other reports on the same problem : " The new Harvard plan for 
college admission " ^ and " The new University of Chicago plan for 
college admission." ^ The latter plan, like the plan recommended by 
the Committee of Nine, recognized that the high school has a func- 
tion other than college preparation, and that, in the articulation of 
the two institutions, this distinctive function must be preserved. 
The report says on this point: 

The university recognizes the obligations which the high schools are under 
to serve their own communities in the most efficient possible way without pri- 
mary regard to college-entrance requirements. It therefore desires to render 

iNat. Ed. Assoc, 1911, pp. 567-571. 

" Ibid., pp. 572—575 (a condensed account only). 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 71 

as flexible as possible the conditions under which students may come to the 
university, and it proposes to set up only such requirements as seem indis- 
pensable to enable the university to continue with advantage the educational 
work begun in the schools. With this principle in mind the university faculty 
has replaced the former schedule of requirements, designating a considerable 
number of specific subjects in which the student must have been prepared, with 
a plan which, save for a requirement in English, lays emphasis not so much 
upon specific subject matter as upon a certain amount of concentrated and 
continuous work in subjects selected by the student or the school from among 
the standard academic subjects taught in all high schools. The quantity of the 
work required is specified in the paragraphs below. The quality of the work 
the university expects to test by the record of the student after he comes to the 
university. 

It is believed that sufficient flexibility has been introduced (1) to permit the 
schools to meet every reasonable demand of their own communities in the 
arrangement of their curricula, (2) to enable the student to enter college even 
though he decides late in his course to do so, and, at the same time, (3) to make 
it justifiable for the university rigidly to require of each student a full 15 units 
of entrance work. There will, consequently, be no admissions with condition 
under the new plan. 

The chief features of this new program of entrance requirements, 
put into effect October 1, 1911, follow : 

ENTRANCE REQUIREMENTS. 

Students applying for entrance to the University of Chicago present by certifi- 
cate from approved schools or by examination 15 units of entrance credits. 
Among these must be 3 units of English and, in addition, 1 principal group of 
3 or more units, and at least 1 secondary group of 2 or more units. These addi- 
tional groups may be selected from among the following subjects : 

1. Ancient languages (Greek and Latin), it being understood that to make a 
group of 2 or of 3 units the work must be offered in a single language. 

2. Modern languages other than English ; to make a group of 2 or of 3 units 
the work must be offered in a single language, as under group 1. 

3. Ancient history, medieval and modern history, English history, United 
States history, civics, economics. 

4. Mathematics. 

5. Physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, general biology, physiology, physi- 
ography, general astronomy. 

In group 5 not less than 1 unit may be offered in either physics or chemistry. 
Any combination of the subjects within each group is permitted. 

Of the 15 units offered for entrance, at least 7 must be selected from the 
subjects in groups 1 to 5. Not less than one-half unit may be offered in any 
subject. 

The remaining 5 units may be selected from any subjects for which credit 
toward graduation is given by the approved school from which the student 
receives his diploma ; but Greek, Latin, French, German (or any language other 
than English), mathematics, physics, and chemistry, if offered, but not as above 
under 1 and 5, must each consist of at least 1 unit. Latin may not be con- 
tinued in college unless at least 2 units be offered. 

SUMMARY OF ENTRANCE REQUIREMENTS. 

Three units of English. 

Three or more units In a single group, 1-5. 

Two or more units in another single group, 1-5. 



72 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Two units in subjects selected from any of the groups 1-5. (Total 10 units 
in English and groups 1-5.) 

Five units selected from any subjects accepted by an approved school for Its 
diploma. 

Not less than one-half unit will be accepted in any subject. 

Entrance with conditions not permitted. 

Still another discussion of the articulation of high school and 
college, that by a committee of the high-school teachers' association 
of New York City, published in pamphlet form, November, 1910, is 
worthy of note because of its content and because it prepared the 
way for the notable report of the committee of nine. The high- 
school committee made a detailed study of the entrance requirements 
of a number of colleges, and drew up a statement setting forth the 
impossibility of wisely meeting the needs of high-school pupils, on 
account of the college requirements. The committee suggested two 
plans for improving the situation: 

1. By the first, college entrance would be based upon the simple fact of 
graduation from a four years' course in a first-class high school. This method 
would give complete satisfaction to the high school. If supplemented by com- 
petent examination into the efficiency of each school, we believe this method 
would tend to develop within the high school that independence, breadth, and 
judgment required to produce the best results. The improvement in the high 
schools would result in better preparation and more students for the college. 

2. The second plan, not as radical as the first, was proposed in order that 
the high schools might derive as soon as possible some measure of relief from 
present conditions. 

This second method calls for — 

(a) The reduction in the number of so-called "required" subjects, together 
with — 

(&) The recognition of all standard subjects, as electives. 

The requirement of two foreign languages from every .student is regarded as 
particularly objectionable. 

The committee reported its conclusions at the annual meeting of 
the association. May 7, 1910. The association ratified its report and 
instructed the committee to send it out and to invite correspondence 
upon the matters involved. 

The committee wrote to the presidents of 115 colleges, to each State 
superintendent of public instruction, and to a number of city superin- 
tendents and high-school principals. The replies to these letters are 
given in the pamphlet,^ and comprise an excellent body of discussion 
bearing on the problems growing out of the relationship between 
high school and college. 

Another investigation bearing on the same general problem, of 
bringing about an adjustment of the parts of our public-school sys- 

1 Articulation of High School and College, issued by the High School Teachers' Associa- 
tion, New York City, 1910. 



EFFORTS TOWAED REORGANIZATION SECOND DECADE. 73 

tern, was made under the auspices of the New York and Brooklyn 
teachers' associations by Charles S. Hartwell. In October, 1906, Mr. 
Hartwell sent out a questionnaire^ on (1) Flexibility in promotion, 
and (2) Should the 12-year course of study be equally divided be- 
tween the elementary school and the secondary school ? 

In commenting upon the returns from the questions relating to 
a division of the course of study, Mr. Hartwell summarized the trend 
of opinion as follows : ^ 

1. School education should be divided into two periods of six years each. 
The subdividing into three-year courses depends on local conditions. 

2. Secondary education should be extended downward to the sixth year. 

3. Departmental teaching should extend throughout the six years of secondary 
education. 

4. During the seventh and possibly the eighth year, or the first and second 
years of the second six, a semidepartmental system, i. e., one in which each 
teacher takes two subjects instead of one, may suffice. 

5. Promotions should be made by subjects throughout the six years of sec- 
ondary education. 

The most recent proposal is that made by a committee of the Cali- 
fornia Council of Education appointed to formulate recommenda- 
tions relating to a readjustment of the courses of study for the 
schools of the State. This report was presented to the council in 
December, 1912, and was formally approved by that body. 

The discussion which was held during the first decade of the 
movement (1888-1900) comprised an examination of the purpose 
and place, in our educational system, of the common school, the high 
school, and the institutions of higher learning. To a large degree 
this discussion was unrelated to anything concrete. While it started 
with a tangible problem — ^the need of lowering the age of college 
graduates — it speedily drifted away from this question and became 
academic in character. The second period (1900-1912), however, 
opened with a series of specific proposals, formulated by President 
Harper, 1902, bearing directly upon a reorganization of the entire 
school system. This brought the discussion back to where it has 
remained during its subsequent progress. The investigations by 
the National Council of Education and by the Department of Sec- 
ondary Education, both under the auspices of the National Educa- 
tion Association, as well as that carried on by the New York and 
Brooklyn teachers' associations, attempted to devise plans of opera- 
tion which would work. For the most part the men who conducted 
the inquiries made during this decade were in administrative posi- 
tions, and naturally, therefore, applied the test of workability to 
every proposal submitted. The same practical end was sought by 

1 See Sch. Rev., vol. 15 (1907), pp. 314-316; tabulation of results, ibid., pp. 454-456. 
2Sch. Rev., vol. 15 (1907), pp. 184-196. 



74 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM, 

Harvard and Chicago in their recommendations respecting the ar- 
ticulation of high school and college. In general, then, it may 
properly be said that the movement toward a functional reorganiza- 
tion of the school system has survived two of the stages through 
which every movement of consequence, on its way from inception 
to practice, must of necessity pass — that of academic discussion and 
that of the consideration of working plans. 

The movement has now entered upon its third stage, that of actual 
adoption and trial. The future only can disclose the result. The 
experiments which have already been made, however, are sufficiently 
numerous to point the way. 



Chapter V. 

EFFORTS TOWARD A FUNCTIONAL REORGANIZATION- 
THE PRACTICE.^ 



Contents. — The grouping of grades among American cities — Tendencies toward uniform- 
ity of grouping — Departures from the typical grouping ; Boston Latin School ; college 
preparatory schools of Chicago and Providenct; — The movement toward reorganiza- 
tion, as exemplified in Peabody, Webster, Marshalltown, Aurora, Selma, Muskegon, 
Kalamazoo, Roanoke, Saginaw, Jacksonville, New Albany, Alameda, Baltimore, 
Olean, Ithaca, Rahway, Richmond, Concord (N. H.), Los Angeles, Berkeley, Min- 
neapolis, the State of New York, the Philippine Islands, the Argentine Republic, 
Japan. 



A canvass made in 1911 of the 669 American cities then listed by 
the United States Commissioner of Education as having a popula- 
tion of 8,000 and over disclosed the following facts respecting the 
length of public-school courses and the years embraced in each divi- 
sion: Four hundred and eighty-nine have a course of eight years 
elementary and four years secondary ; 48 have a course of seven years 
elementary and four years secondary ; 86 have one of nine years ele- 
mentary (not including the kindergarten) and four years secondary; 
7 have the usual eight years elementary, but offer only three years in 
the high school ; 4 have a course of eight years elementary and five 
years secondary; 3 have organized on the basis of seven years ele- 
mentary and five years secondary ; 8 are represented in the plans call- 
ing for six years elementary and four years secondary, seven years 
elementary and three years secondary, and nine years elementary and 
three years secondary; and 24 have made or are making significant 
departures from the foregoing tj^pes. 

With a few exceptions the cities having a nine-year elementary 
course are among the New England States. This arrangement dates 
back to 1872, when the school superintendents of New England, in 
formal session at Worcester, Mass., fixed the age of entrance at 5 and 
adopted a program of studies for primary and grammar schools to 
cover nine years.^ Among the Southern States, the typical elemen- 
tary course is one of seven years, probably adopted because of the 
poverty of the people and their inability to make further provision 
for school work when their school systems were established. 

1 For later information than is contained in this chapter see Rept. of U. S. Comr. of 
Ed. for 1914, Vol. I, Ch. VI, and 1915, Ch. li and V. 

2 The Massachusetts Teacher, October, 1873, 

5930°— 16 6 75 



76 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Leaving out of consideration, for the moment, the cities which are 
consciously seeking to bring about a functional reorganization of 
their systems, certain tendencies are to be noted among the other 
groups. First, among the cities whose elementary period is nine 
years, several are shortening their courses to eight. This change is 
being effected in two ways: By eliminating one year entirely from 
the elementary division, beginning the school period at 6, instead of 
5 years ; and by transferring one year of the elementary division to 
the high school, making the course of the latter five years in length, 
an arrangement limited to those New England cities which find the 
task of preparing for college too gi^eat for four years. Second, 
among the cities in the South having but a three-year high-school 
course a decided tendency is apparent to add a year and thus secure 
a closer adjustment to the colleges. Third, many cities are making 
their systems so flexible that the exceptional child is enabled to 
shorten the time necessary for completing the public-school course. 
These tendencies may be fairly summarized by saying that the move- 
ment, which has been under way since city school systems were first 
established, is strongly in the direction of uniformity through 
adopting the eight-four arrangement; also toward securing, within 
the limits of such a grouping, means for enabling the pupils who 
possess marked ability to pass through their grades more rapidly 
than their fellows. It should be noted, furthermore, that, for the 
most part, in cities having a nine-year elementary period, the chil- 
dren enter at 5 years of age ; in cities having a seven-year course, the 
age of enrollment is usually fixed at 7 ; and in cities whose elementary 
course is eight years children must have reached the age of 6 before 
enrollment is permitted. In these three groups, therefore, the age at 
which the pupil normally completes his elementary course and enters 
upon high-school work is practically the same, 14 or thereabouts. In 
consequence, it may be said that, in this country, custom and law 
have fixed the years from 5, 6, or 7, to 14, as the period for elementary 
schooling; from 14 to 18, inclusive, as the period for secondary edu- 
cation ; and from 18 to 22, inclusive, as the period for college work, 
the termination of w^iich is marked by the granting of the bachelor 
of arts degree or its academic equivalent. 

Before discussing the departures from the typical grouping which 
are now deliberately being made, two interesting modifications, not 
yet mentioned, should be noted : That of the Boston Latin School and 
that of the college preparatory schools of Chicago, 111., and Provi- 
dence, R. I. 

The Boston Latin School, founded in 1635, is of interest in this 
connection because, for more than 50 years, it has had a course of 
study covering six years, to which boys of 10 or 11, who have satisfied 
certain scholastic requirements, are admitted.^ The school is a sur- 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 77 

vival of the colonial grammar schools that were founded primarily 
as college fitting schools, but which rapidly disappeared in the face of 
the demand for an education suited to the needs of the masses." 
These schools, in respect to defined aim, character of curricula, length 
of courses, and even the regulations governing the conduct of the 
pupils, were transplanted direct from England and at a time when 
the colleges were dominated by the idea that the classics were neces- 
sary to a complete education. In specific purpose, the Boston Latin 
School was established to prepare boys for Harvard College. All 
efforts which have been made toward compelling it to recognize, in 
its course of study, the nonpreparatory functions of the public high 
school, have been successfully resisted. In 1868 an attempt which 
sought to merge the school with the Boston English School was de- 
feated. In 1877 a proposal was made to secure the admission of 
girls, and several hearings were given to the matter ; but the decision 
of the school committee was adverse to the petitioners.^ One of its 
early head masters wrote : 

The work of the Latin School is to prepare the student to enter college with 
the kind of instruction which shall best enable him to pursue a college course. 
In a word, its work is to feed the professions ; and so long as Boston needs 
clergymen, doctors, and lawyers, it is right and proper that she should see to it 
'that a free school is provided, so that her humblest citizen may secure to his 
children a classical, college education, and that poverty may be no insurmount- 
able obstacle to talent.* 

Except during an interval of some six years about 1870,^ it has 
steadfastly held to the aim of its founders. Even in the school regu- 
lations of the city of Boston (1910) the school is not called a high 
school, as is shown by the chapter heading, " Eegulations for Latin 
and High Schools." To this day it stands out in striking opposition 
to the dominant conception that those institutions of secondary rank 
which are maintained at public expense shall minister to the needs of 
all rather than to the demand of a particular class that intend to 
enter college. 

In the Chicago experiment of founding college preparatory schools, 
and in the " junior course " organized in several of the high schools 
of Providence, R. I., similar efforts have been made to segregate 
prospective college students. It is interesting to observe, further- 
more, that these attempts were made because of the direct influence 
of the Boston Latin School. 

A graduate of the Boston Latin School and of Harvard University, 
Hon. Charles S. Thornton, as a member of the board of education of 
Chicago, in March, 1894, proposed the following resolution : 

1 Rules of the School Committee of Boston (1910), pp. 95-97. 

~ See p. 11. 

^ Jenks, Catalogue of the Boston Latin School, p. 138. 

*Ibid., p. 77. 

"Ibid., pp. 69-71. 



78 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Resolved, That a school, to be called " The Chicago College Preparatory 
School," with a course of study and upon conditions substantially as hereinafter 
set forth, be organized; that a competent corps of instructors be employed; and 
that the same begin with the commencement of the next school year. 

This resolution was accompanied by a tentative six-year course of 
study, which provided that pupils should enter upon the work after 
the completion of the first six years of the elementary course. In 
May of the same year (1894) the plan was adopted, and an amount 
not exceeding $5,000 was set aside for the expenses of the first year 
of trial. The original hope of those proposing this plan was to 
establish an independent school, in a separate building, the whole 
modeled after the Boston Latin School. However, sufficient funds 
were not available, and in consequence vacant rooms, wherever they 
could be found, were pressed into service, with the result that in 
September, 1894, classes with an aggregate enrollment of 150 pupils 
were organized in three of the high-school buildings. Two years 
later (September, 1896) the number of pupils in these classes had 
fallen to fewer than one-half of the original enrollment. This loss 
was due to long distances, poor accommodations, incompetent instruc- 
tion, and to other adverse circumstances. The pupils entering the 
regular high-school course from these classes, at the beginning of 
their ninth year, were scattered about among 14 schools; hence no 
satisfactory conclusions could be draw^n respecting their progress. 
One class, however, that at the Hyde Park High School, was kept 
intact, and made such excellent progress as to warrant the contin- 
uance of the experiment. In July, 1895, on petition of over 1,200 
families, the board established some 30 class centers for the accom- 
modation of pupils who wished to take the course. Before the close 
of the year, however, upon recommendation of one of its committees, 
the board abolished these centers and schools.^ 

A plan having the same object, as well as the same defect, was in- 
augurated in Providence, R. I., in 1898. In each of four high 
schools the " junior course" was formed for those pupils who wished 
to specialize at college in classics or modern languages. Besides the 
regular studies of the seventh and eighth years of the grammar 
schools, somewhat modified, this course included French in the first 
year and French, Latin, and some algebra, along with arithmetic, 
in the second. The work in French, Latin, and algebra was regarded 
as additional to the regular work of the seventh and eighth years 
rather than as a substitute for it, and in consequence the course was 
limited to those pupils whose scholarship in the lower grades was 
superior. After a trial of one year the course was abandoned in 

1 For an account of this experiment see Nightingale, Sch. Rev. (1898), vol. 6, pp. 
379-393. 



EFFORTS TOWAED REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 79 

three of the four high schools because of light attendance and be- 
cause " the difference in results seemed of questionable value," though, 
in response to the desire of a particular section, the course was re- 
tained in one of the schools. However, stringent regulations restrict- 
ing admission, the burden of carrying additional subjects, and the 
indifferent attitude to the plan of those in authority resulted in such 
a reduction of the number taking the work that the course, though 
still maintained, " has now become a matter of small significance." 

The weakness of the Chicago and Providence plans, which is 
doubtless the real reason for the failure of the arrangement in both 
instances, is clearly set forth in the comment of Dr. Nightingale, 
who was superintendent of the Chicago high schools at the time the 
experiment was tried. Commenting upon the Chicago plan, he said : 

Ideally beautiful and fascinatingly unique as these separate and distinct in- 
stitutions may seem for tlie select 400, we must not lose sight of the essential 
fact that it is the underlying purpose of the schools of the people and for the 
people to give our youth a preparation for life and for citizenship rather than 
for college, and it is our duty to give all the children, stop where they must, 
the best education possible to the limit of their privilege.* 

Among the cities in which the school authorities are making a 
definite and deliberate effort to readjust their school systems on a 
functional basis, one finds many stages and gradations of develop- 
ment, as well as much variation in form, because of local causes and 
differing educational conceptions held by those in authority. A 
sufficient number of examples can be given to indicate the trend of 
the movement and the proportions which it has already reached. 
The facts respecting the following city systems have been provided, 
in most instances, by the superintendents : ^ 

Peahody, Mass. Albert RoMnson, superintendent. — The system now com- 
prises eight years in the elementary division and five years in the secondary. 
The ninth grade was transferred to the high-school building in 1905, "partly 
for educational reasons and partly because of local conditions." The superin- 
tendent added: 

The change was made for the reason that the worli [of the ninth grade] 
could be done better in the high schools than in the grammar schools. Perhaps 
the strongest reason for adding the year to the high-school course is that many 
pupils found it difficult to prepare for some colleges in four years. 

The course of study pursued by the ninth-grade pupils is an integral part of 
the high-school course, which now covers five years. The grammar-school course 
is eight years in length, and has not been materially modified by the transfer of 
the ninth grade to the high school. This shift may, perhaps, be in the direction 
of a six-year secondary period, but probably it signifies nothing beyond a 
response to the pressure of college-entrance requirements. If the latter be 

1 Nightingale, Sch. Rev. (1895), vol. 3, pp. 337-8. 

3 For further illustrative statements, see An. Repts. Commls. of Ed., 1914, Vol. I, ch. 6, 
especially pp. 135-157, and 1915, Vol. I, ch. 5, p. 113. A list of junior high schools is 
given in the report of 1914. 



80 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

the explanation, the city should properly be classed with the group mentioned 
on page 76, wherein is to be found a movement from a nine-year elementary 
period toward the eight-four plan. 

Webster, Mass. E. W. Robinson, superintendent. — This city is another illus- 
tration of a shift from a nine-four grouping to an eight-five, through the 
pressure of university demands. The superintendent wrote : 

Nine years ago I found a nine-year elementary course which seemed inflated 
and a congested four-year high-school course which was not properly equip- 
ping students for eastern colleges. Many of the grammar-school boys were 
dropping out at the end of or during the eighth-grade course. By absorbing 
the ninth grade into the high-school course as a preparatory year, under the 
control of the high-school principal, I stiffened up the entire high-school course, 
and also offered inducement for boys and girls to remain in the eighth grade 
for their diplomas, which came a year earlier by this method. 

Marshalltown, Iowa. A. Palmer, superintendent. — The eighth grade of this 
city was transfei'red to the high school, primarily on account of the fact that 
the ward buildings were crowded and room was desired in each for a kinder- 
garten. The eighth-grade course has not yet been included in the high-school 
course, nor has the transfer changed the course pursued by the eighth grade, 
except in this, that the work is now carried on departmentally. The course of 
the first seven grades has not been modified by reason of the transfer. 

Aurora, III. C. M. Bardwell, superintendent. — The school department offers 
in the high school four courses, each four years in length ; and two courses, 
the " Latin " and the " general," each of five years. The latter entitles pupils 
" to advance credit in some of the colleges and saves from one-half to a whole 
year on their college course." Besides, several high-school subjects are studied 
in the seventh and eighth grades; elementary geometry in the seventh grade; 
elementary algebra in the B eighth and A eighth grades; and the history of 
Greece in the A eighth. In another year, the superintendent hopes building 
arrangements vdll be such as to enable him to introduce in the upper grammar 
grades industrial and vocational work, with opportunity for electives. 

Selma, Ala. Arthur F. Harman, superintendent. — At the beginning of the 
fall term, 1909, the change was made from the eight-four grouping to the 
seven-five, by transferring the eighth grade to the high school and making it a 
regular part of the high-school course. The change was made partly because 
of expediency and partly because of the educational advantages of the new 
arrangement. It enabled the work of the eighth grade to be conducted depart- 
mentally, and it was also thought that problems of discipline would thereby 
be lessened. Says the superintendent: 

Experience has verified the correctness of the belief. The eighth-year pupils 
also enjoy under the new plan whatever advantages there are under depart- 
mental teaching. Local conditions are such that we can not yet have depart- 
mental work in the upper grammar grades. We were also convinced that 
placing eighth-year pupils in the high school would be the means of increasing 
the enrollment in the secondary division. AVithout knowing just what part 
of the increase must be attributed to increased population, I may mention that 
the enrollment in the high school during the past session was 20 per cent 
larger than the enrollment of 1908-9. Indications are that the enrollment will 
be materially increased during the current session. 

Muskegon, Mich. Joseph M. Frost, superintendent. — This city is now organ- 
ized with the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grades grouped in the high school 
proper ; the eighth and ninth in the high-school annex ; the seventh grades of 
the entire city congregated in one school for departmental work ; and the first 
six grades occupying ward buildings. This plan was adopted in 1904, in order 
to give the children an opportunity to take work in manual training earlier 
than the ninth year. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 81 



The superintendent, in commenting upon tlie plan, says : 



The departmental work in the seventh grade is conducted very much as the 
work in the high school, except that the students are kept under closer super- 
vision, and we are able to give them special instruction along the lines of their 
interests. The present arrangement is very satisfactory and is a great improve- 
ment over the old plan. When it was adopted a large number of people peti- 
tioned the board of education to have the old eighth-grade system reestablished. 
They said they would rather have their children have the old-fashioned eighth- 
grade system than a complete high-school course. They did not want their 
children sent to the high school at such an immature age. I felt that the oppo- 
sition was due entirely to the fact that the parents did not like any system 
that was dififerent from the one employed when they went to school. We have 
continued this plan and now I think that the community at large is entirely 
in sympathy with it. In fact, it keeps the children in school, and makes the 
transition from the grades to the high school easier. It also gradually intro- 
duces the student to the freedom of the high school by having the close super- 
vision in the seventh grade and less close when in the eighth and ninth, and 
greater freedom in the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth. I could cite many instances 
showing how boys have been kept in school by getting them properly started 
in their high-school work in the eighth year. If a boy does not like academic 
work, we give him more manual training and try to show him the need of having 
academic work along with it. 

Kalamazoo, Mich. 8. 0. Hartwell, superintendent. — The eleventh and twelfth 
grades of this department are congregated at one school ; and the eighth, ninth, 
and tenth are at departmental schools, which are studied at points convenient 
to the several sections of the city. The first seven grades occupy, in one 
instance, a separate building and in the others the lower floors of the depart- 
mental schools. While local conditions have brought about this arrangement, 
, yet a recognition of its educational possibilities is clearly evident. 

In the eighties the eighth grades of the entire city were congregated in a 
building near the high school. In 1902 the need for additional room for the 
upper grades developed. It was also seen that the high-school building would 
soon be overcrowded. To meet these difficulties, an eight-room addition, for the 
lower grades, was made to the building formerly occupied by the eighth grades 
and the older part was given over to a departmental school embracing the 
eighth and ninth grades. When these pupils were ready for the tenth year 
they were retained at the school and not transferred to the high school until 
the beginning of their eleventh, year. The results in increased enrollment, in 
efficiency of work, and especially in the growth of the ninth grade, through the 
familiarity of the eighth grade with the work and methods of the ninth, caused 
the adoption of the same plan when a new building was erected (1906) in 
another part of the city. This building was designed to provide ten rooms on 
the lower floor for the lower grades; and an assembly and recitation rooms on 
the upper floor for the work of the eighth, ninth, and tenth grades. So satis- 
factorily did this arrangement work that three years ago, when a new building 
was required in a third section of the city, it was planned on the same lines. 

In the departmental schools promotion is made by subject, as in the high 
school. Before an eighth-grade pupil has completed the whole of his work, 
he may begin high-school studies, and an increasing number are availing them- 
selves of this opportunity. The superintendent adds: 

While we have not departed very largely as yet from the traditional lines of 
work in the grammar grades, we have secured, I think, this result, the teaching 
force of the departmentals has been brought near high-school standards in 
scholarship, and the quality of the work done has been improved. 

Roanoke, Va. Harris Hart, superintendent. — The school department is being 
changed from the eight-four grouping to a five-three-three system. The primary 



82 KEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. ^ 

divisions will embrace five grades ; the intermediate division, the sixth, seventh, 
and eighth grades; and the high-school division the ninth, tenth, and eleventh 
grades. The chief change to be made in the course of study for the present is 
the elimination of one year of w^ork, the whole course to be covered in 11 
years instead of 12. The chief reasons which have led the superintendent to 
urge this reorganization are: The desirability of separating the older and 
younger children; the need for providing optional studies for older pupils; 
and the wish to secure a number of male instructors in the sixth, seventh, and 
eighth grades. Through the operation of this plan, the superintendent hopes 
to secure, as he says : 

A better course of training in 11 years than I now have in 12 and a larger 
percentage of boys held in school beyond the sixth grade. The mere idea of 
going to a different school building of a higher grade will be an incentive to 
those students who weary of the same school and the same teachers, and par- 
ticularly of the same system of discipline for seven or eight years. And by 
doing some of the high-school work in the intermediate building I expect to so 
far pave the way into the high school as to eliminate any break'. 

Saginaw, Mich. E. C. Warriner, superintendent. — In June, 1898, upon the 
recommendation of the former superintendent, A. S. Whitney, now of the Uni- 
versity of Michigan, a six-year high-school course of study was adopted for the 
six upper grades of the Saginaw schools. This was probably the first effort 
made in the North Central States to provide a high-school curriculum covering 
fcix years. Two courses were offered, a " language " course, providing a broad 
literary culture with preparation for colleges and universities, and a " general " 
course leading toward business pursuits. Except in the seventh and eighth 
years of the " language " course, some electives were offered, ranging from 8 
hours per week in the ninth year to 34 per week in the twelfth. Pupils, there- 
fore, who pursued either course intensively for the six years were enabled to 
shorten their university course by one year. A year after the adoption of the 
plan Supt. Whitney resigned, and the plan which he inaugurated seems to have 
been modified gradually, until to-day about the only items which remain are 
the departmental plan of instruction and the option of German, which is offered 
to the pupils of the seventh grade. Inasmuch as the community contains a 
large percentage of Germans, it has not been difficult to retain the study of the 
language, which so many in the community speak.^ 

Jacksonville, III. W. A. Furr, superintendent. — This city is in a transition 
stage from the eight-four grouping to some form of the six-six division. Supt. 
Furr writes : 

A failure to erect a building has delayed a final consummation of our plans 
for a six-year high-school course. I think we shall have a straight six-six 
course. We have been talking this plan for a couple of years and have taken 
steps toward reorganizing our course preparatory to a change in the grouping. 

New Albany, Ind. H. A. Buerlc, superintendent. — Supt. Buerk has gathered 
all of the eighth-grade pupils of the city into one building and is conducting the 
work therein by departments. He proposes, through expanding it, eventually to 
make the school serve as a transition stage between the grades and the high 
school. 

Alameda), Cal. W. C. Wood, superintendent. — The Alameda plan illustrates 
an attempt to work out a functional readjustment rather than a reorganization. 
The elementary division of these schools comprises eight years and the high- 
school division four years. Without segregating the pupils of the upper gram- 
mar grades, however, the effort is being made to shape the course of study in 

1 For Supt. Whitney's course see Appendix, pp. 160-162. 



EFFORTS TOWAED REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 



83 



the light of the conception of preadoleseent and adolescent stages in the psycho- 
physical development of the child. Supt. Wood writes : 

We should define elementary education as preadoleseent education and sec- 
ondary education as adolescent education. Elementary education should con- 
cern itself chiefly with putting the child into possession of the working tools of 
knowledge and the development of those faculties and powers which may rightly 
be developed during childhood. Secondary education should concern itself 
chiefly with the general adjustment of the individual to the physical, social, and 
spiritual environment. 

With the half-hour period as a basis for assignment, the time allotment under 
the Alameda plan follows: 

Time allotment under the Alameda plan. 

SEVENTH YEAR. 



Courses. 



Study 
periods. 



Prescribed courses: 

English- 
Literature J 

Grammar 

Composition; spelling 

Arithmetic 

History and civics 

Geography 

Physiology 

Drawing 

Manual training or domestic science 

Music 

Total 

Elective courses: i 

French 

German 

Everyday English 




EIGHTH YEAR. 



Prescribed courses: 
English- 
Literature 

Grammar 

Composition; spelling 

Commercial arithmetic or elementary mathematics 

History and civics , 

Geography 

Music 

Total 

Elective courses: 2 

Manual arts 

French 

German 

Everyday English 

General science 



2 


2 


2 


2 


2 


1 


5 


5 


3 


3 


3 


3 


2 





19 


16 


5 





5 


5 


5 


5 


5 





5 


5 



1 The student should elect one of these. 



2 The student should elect two of these. 



Baltimore, Md. James H. Van Sickle, formerly supervntendent. — The Balti- 
more plan, as worked out by Supt. Van Sickle, permits pupils who have done 
strong work in the sixth grade to take up extra studies of high-school grade 
while doing the regular work of the seventh and eighth grades of the elemen- 
tary schools. These studies are Latin, German or French, advanced English, 
and, with some classes, part of the mathematics of the high-school course. The 
pupils who wish to take this work are transferred to a convenient center at 
which sufficient pupils may be congregated to allow the instruction to be organ- 
ized on the departmental plan. Supt. Van Sickle, writing in 1910, says : 



84 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

We started in 1902 with one center and 173 pupils, and that year we admitted 
pupils of the eighth grade as well as of the seventh. In 1903 and later admission 
was limited to pupils just entering the seventh grade. We now have four 
centers, with an enrollment of 571 pupils in these preparatory seventh and 
eighth grade classes. For three years one of these centers has been allowed, by 
way of experiment, to keep selected pupils for an extra year. Such pupils spend 
but two years in the high school. Other preparatory pupils ordinarily spend 
three years in the high school, but in either case the time required for high- 
school graduation after the sixth elementary grade has ordinarily been five 
years for the preparatory-class pupils, whereas six years would have been re- 
quired had it not been for the high-school credits earned by these pupils in the 
elementary schools. 

Two hundred and thirty-six preparatory pupils will have been graduated from 
the high schools in the four years ending in June, 1910. This is not a large 
showing when we consider that in these four years the same high schools 
(three out of five in our city) have graduated 1,342 pupils, but the plan is very 
new compared with the usual one, and a number of obstacles must yet be over- 
come. Some parents do not fully understand the plan. Not all teachers can be 
quite impartial in their attitude toward a scheme of work which takes away 
from the regular classes some of the more desirable pupils. Furthermore, many 
pupils entering the seventh grade are timid about going to a strange school 
located at a point somewhat distant from their homes, and so it happens that 
only about one-third of those recommended as capable of taking up the extra 
preparatory work avail themselves of the opportunity offered. If the work 
were carried on in every large school so that pupils could enter upon it with- 
out being transferred away from the home school, doubtless more would attend ; 
but unless there are enough enrolled at one point to form at least three 
classes the teaching can not be economically provided for. For this reason we 
are using for the preparatory classes only selected centers, and for the further 
reason that our plan enables us to utilize schoolrooms in portions of the 
city where the population is decreasing and where consequently some school- 
rooms have become vacant. 

There are now enrolled in our preparatory classes in the elementary schools 
571 pupils ; and in the high school, exclusive of students to graduate in June, 
there are now 223 students who were promoted from preparatory classes. The 
belief that ability, or even genius, is not restricted to any rank of life is con- 
firmed in the case of our preparatory pupils by the interesting fact that in these 
classes are to be found boys and girls representing every rank of the social 
order and wide variety of home conditions. Judging by the energy and en- 
thusiasm that these selected pupils put into their work, and the marked success 
which they have so far attained, as measured by school standards, we are quite 
certain that they will display somewhat more of energy and efficiency in what- 
ever field of life effort they enter than if, during their school days, they had 
become contented with a lower level of effort and attainment. 

Olean, N. Y. S. J. Slawson, superintendent. — All pupils in the school de- 
partment of this city, upon completing their seventh-grade work, enter the high 
school. The entire eighth grade and the beginning ninth are assembled in the 
same study hall, with the exception of the senior class; and the remaining 
classes, the upper ninth, the tenth, and the beginning twelfth, are broken into 
sections and distributed about the building, without reference to grade. By 
this arrangement an elementary period of seven years and a secondary period 
of five years are secured. Says the superintendent : 

During the past four years the course of study for the elementary grades 
has been so modified as to enable us to complete in seven years what formerly 
required eight and a half or nine years. For instance, four years ago we were 
giving eight and one-half years to arithmetic, whereas the subject is now 
covered in seven years. Geography, now completed in seven years, required 
eight full years. History, now completed in seven and one-half years, was given, 
formerly, nine years. The work in elementary English, which formerly required 
eight and one-half years, has been modified by eliminating the nonessentials 
of technical grammar and establishing therefor a quantity of literature. We 
still give eight years to the study of the subject. 



EFPOETS TOWARD EEOEGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 85 

Ithaca, N. Y. F. D. Boynton, superintendent. — The department of this city 
is now organized on the six-six plan. The change which has finally resulted 
in the present arrangement has been underway in this city for a number of 
years. The study of geography, as such, is discontinued with the sixth grade. 
In the seventh, or first high-school grade, the formal study of history is begun ; 
an option in Latin is offered; and two hours of work per week is required in 
each of the following subjects: Music, drawing, and manual training. In the 
eighth grade, options are offered in German, biology, elementary algebra, 
ancient history, and literature. The superintendent writes : 

Our chief difiiculty was in getting properly trained teachers, principally be- 
cause the salary of the old seventh and eighth grades was not attractive. We 
now have these grades on the same salary schedule as the high school. In con- 
sequence, our eighth grade is now taught by college graduates alone, and our 
seventh grade, either by college graduates or college trained teachers who are 
normal graduates. 

Rahway, N. J. William J. Bickett, superintendent. — In September, 1910, a 
change was made from the eight-four grouping to the six-six. The reorganiza- 
tion led to the introduction of German, French, Latin, and algebra as electives 
in the seventh and eighth grades ; to promotion by subjects ; and to the giving 
of credit for work in music, woodwork, cooking, and sewing. The superintend- 
ent says: 

This has been the most successful change ever made in our school system. 
Formerly a large proportion of our pupils were leaving school at the end of 
the eighth year, thinking that an eighth-grade education was sufiicient. Fur- 
thermore, pupils entering the high school were not remaining, the loss in the 
freshman class, largely due to a change in the methods of teaching employed, 
' amounting to about 30 per cent. The marked increase in high-school attend- 
ance under the present plan is evidence of its success. 

Richmond, Ind. T. A. Mott, superintendent. — Since 1896 the seventh and 
eighth grades of this city have been congregated in a separate building, cen- 
trally situated, where the work is carried on departmentally, as in the high 
school. Promotion in this school is made by subjects and credits, rather 
than by classes. For the past 10 years the department has offered three lines 
of work in this school, each of which leads to the high school — a Latin course, 
a German course, and ohe in which the study of English predominates. The 
great majority of the pupils divide between the Latin and German courses, 
for each of which they may receive two or three high-school credits for their 
work, thus enabling them either to complete their high-school work in a shorter 
time or to elect additional subjects. Furthermore, pupils in the eighth grade 
who have done strong work in the seventh are permitted to take high-school 
algebra in addition to their regular work ; thus the pupils of exceptional ability 
are provided for. " We are more than pleased," the superintendent wrote, 
" with the plan. We do better grammar-school work than under the old ar- 
rangement, and more pupils go on to the high school from the eighth grade 
than formerly." The size of the building used for the intermediate grades 
determined that two of the grades only should be assigned to the lower high 
school and that four should be congregated at the upper high-school building. 
Had the buildings permitted, the ninth grade would have been kept with the 
seventh and eighth grades.* 

Concord, N. R. L. J. Rundlett, superintendent. — In September, 1910, the 
old plan of eight years elementary and four years secondary was changed to 
six years elementary and five years secondary, and the latter division was 
broken into two groups, one of two years (lower) and the other of three 

1 For course of study see Appendix, p. 164. 



86 EEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM, 

years (upper), each in separate buildings. By this plan a year's time is saved, 
for it was thought that the year could readily be compensated for through 
carefully conserving the recitation periods, vphere it was believed much time 
was being wasted. The superintendent also urged, among other merits, that 
the plan would enable the child of the laborer to i-emain in school longer; 
that it would enable poor students to enter college earlier ; and that it would 
eliminate what, under the old plan, would be the freshman class from the 
athletic and social dissipations of the high school. 

In effecting the reorganization the plan was submitted to the board of educa- 
tion and then to the people through the press. The superintendent addressed 
several meetings of the citizens on the details of the proposal. The chief ob- 
stacle to its adoption, however, was not with the people, but with the teachers 
of the high school, who seemed to shrink at the thought of breaking with tradi- 
tion. 

The superintendent is pleased with the results. He writes : 

Tliis arrangement has accomplished all the things hoped for it, and besides 
has cemented more closely the courses of study in the elementary and high 
schools; has fitted more closely the textbooks and methods of teaching to the 
ages of the pupils; has also enabled the teachers to accomplish more with the 
old first year in the high school than was ever accomplished before in the his- 
tory of our schools. Furthermore, it has enabled pupils to choose from high- 
school courses earlier and with better guidance, and to raise the standard of 
scholarship in all grades below those conducted on the old high-school plan.* 

Los Angeles, Cal. J. H. Francis, superintendent. — In September, 1910, the 
seventh and eighth grades of several schools in one section of Los Angeles were 
congregated at the San Pedro Street School (B. W. Reed, principal) for depart- 
mental work, in which certain optional subjects were offered and in which 
promotion was made by points. So well did the experiment succeed that in Sep- 
tember, 1911, four buildings, situated at points central to important attendance 
districts, were cleared of lower-grade children and filled with the seventh, 
eighth, and ninth grades, who were drawn from the schools which they formerly 
attended. The department is also committed to the plan of extending the high 
school upward two years as well as downward. Ultimately, when all details 
h&ve been worked out, the school department will comprise the following 
groups: An elementary division, beyond the kindei'garten, of six years; an 
"intermediate-school" division of three years; and a "high-school" period, 
covering five years and giving work which is the equivalent of that to be had in 
the freshman and sophomore years of college curricula. 

Supt. Francis, in speaking of the organization, writes as follows: 

This grouping is necessary from physiological, psychological, and sociological 
viewpoints. 

Physiologically and psychologically the content of things taught and the 
method of presentation should differ with the preadolescent and the adolescent 
child. The principles involved are too well known to the teacher to justify 
discussion. With the facts so patent and well known, the marvel is we have 
tolerated the present grouping so long. 

From the sociological viewpoint we hope to benefit greatly the child who will 
attend high school, the child who will not attend high school, the pupils who 
will go to the university, and the pupils who will not go to the university. Of 
these groups we regard the second and last as of greatest importance. A fifth 
thing, and no less important, we hope to accomplish is that of holding boys and 
girls in school through the only logical and rational means, that of interest in 
the work they are doing. 

I have no doubt but that the new grouping will result in — 

(1) A saving of time. All that is meritorious that we are accomplishing in 
our 16 years of school work can be done better in 14 years under proper 

1 For course of study see Appendix, p. 165. 



EFFORTS TOWAED EEOEGANIZATION THE PEACTICE. 87 

organization. Tliere is enougli tliat we are not doing, and tlaat should be done, 
to occupy ttie other two years. 

(2) A conservation of right ideals. The attitude of the average pupil toward 
scholarship and mental attainments is not sound, and as a result our schools 
are not producing thinkers. I believe the content and methods of instruction in 
seventh and eighth grades under the old plan to be responsible in part for this 
undesirable condition. 

(3) A larger number and better class of students in the high schools and 
universities. Both to-day are carrying many who should not be there, for they 
lack purpose and will not make adequate returns to society for the money and 
the effort expended upon them. On the other hand, there are countless numbers 
who should be in attendance in these schools and are not because of discourage- 
ments due to courses of study and the time and money necessary to get what 
they desire. 

(4) A grouping and presentation of subjects that will enable us to do for the 
intermediate pupil what the high school today is doing for its pupils. 

(5) A grouping and presentation of subjects that will enable our 14-year 
high schools to produce technically trained men and women in music, art, com- 
merce, industry, agriculture, and home economics. 

(6) Allowing the university to occupy its legitimate field and do real uni- 
versity work. 

I thoroughly believe that the reorganization of the school system along these 
lines is the largest and most significant educational movement in modern times.* 

Berkeley, Cal. Frank F. Bunker, formerly superintendent. — In December, 
1909, the board of education authorized the reorganization of the schools on 
the basis of a six-three-three grouping. The plan proposed that, at or near 
the center of each geographical quarter of the city, there should be erected, a 
separate building, adapted particularly to the needs of the seventh, eighth, 
and ninth grades of the section. At the center of the city stood the high-school 
'building, which, it was proposed, should be reserved for the tenth, eleventh, 
and twelfth grades. In January, 1910, three lower high schools were opened 
and the necessary transfers made. In August, 1911, the fourth school of the 
same character was opened, which date marked the end of the transition 
period, during which time the change from the old to the new system was 
being brought about. The plan, in respect to the form of organization, is now 
in full operation. A detailed description, together with a discussion of the 
difficulties which arose in its inauguration, are to be found in the next chapter.^ 

Minneapolis, Minn. Charles M. Jordan, superintendent. — The effort which is 
being made in Minneapolis by one of the civic clubs to secure the adoption of 
an educational plan wherein the divisions shall be based on function, and the 
discussion which this effort is arousing, will be helpful to other communities 
which are seeking to bring about a similar reorganization. The educational 
committee of the Minneapolis Commercial Club took up a careful consideration 
of the whole question of the reorganization of the public-school system of 
Minneapolis. After a discussion covering a year and a half the committee 
submitted in April, 1910, a report to the public-affairs committee of the club, 
with the request that, if it met with approval, the committee be authorized 
to present the plan to the board of education and urge its adoption. By unani- 
mous vote the public-affairs committee approved the report and authorized the 
educational committee to lay it before the board of education and shortly 
thereafter this was done. The board referred the committee's plan to Supt. 
Jordan, with the request that he present his objections to its adoption. More 
recently the board has appointed, a committee of 20 grade-school principals to 
examine the proposals at greater length. Because the Minneapolis discussion 

1 For course of study in intermediate scliools see Appendix, p. 167. 

2 For course of study see Appendix, pp. 169-172. 



88 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Koes to the heart of the matter and, therefore, is of general interest, it is here 
given in full : 

A Plan fob the Rearkangement of the Public School System of the City 

OF Minneapolis. 

I. THE PLAN. 

A. We recommend that intermediate schools be established comprising the 
seventh, eighth, and ninth grades. This involves— 

(«) The housing of these grades together in buildings exclusively devoted 
to that purpose. 

(b) The establishment of such administrative relations between each high 
school and the intermediate schools in its district as to avoid any hiatus 
between them, any duplication of work, or any lowering of the standard in 
such high-school subjects as may continue to be ofCered in the ninth grade. 

We would suggest that this end may be most surely attained by making 
each high-school principal the supervisor of the intermediate schools in his 
district. 

B. We further recommend that differentiation begin at the seventh grade, 
at least to the extent of offering two parallel courses, one containing much 
handwork and intensive training in practical branches, the other emphasizing 
preparation for high school. 

C. Finally, we recommend that promotion in the intermediate schools be 
by subjects in place of by grades. 

II. the keasons. 

In our opinion the foregoing provisions are all equally essential to the suc- 
cess of the plan. The reasons for this conclusion are, in brief, as follows: 

1. A thousand pupils drop out of school every year in Minneapolis during 
or at the end of the eighth grade, and another thousand during or at the end 
of the ninth grade ; that is, before being in high school long enough to accom- 
plish anything worth while. If this combined army of 2,000 children who 
now leave school every year in Minneapolis prepared for doing nothing in 
particular could be given a unified course, under one roof, beginning at the 
seventh gi'ade, the effect would be — (a) to hold in school through the ninth 
grade many of those who now leave during or at the end of the eighth grade ; 
and (6) to give them all a far more valuable preparation for practical life 
than is now possible. 

2. At about 12 years of age, which usually marks the beginning of adolescence, 
children begin to differ markedly in their tastes and cajjacity ; and to attempt 
longer to teach them all everything offered in these grades, or which may profit- 
ably be offered there, is in our opinion a grievous waste of the pupils' time, the 
teachers' energy, and the people's money. 

3. In the face of these growing differences between pupils, to compel them to 
repeat subjects which they have mastered, merely because they have failed in 
other subjects in the same grade, is to cultivate apathy and distaste for school. 

4. A large percentage of those who leave school during the eighth and ninth 
years are boys, and it is well known that many of these now lack interest and 
energy in school work. We believe that such changes as are recommended would 
tend to hold their interest and increase their energy during these years. Moreover, 
if interest in school work is once aroused many who would otherwise drop out at 
the first opportunity are likely to continue through the entire high-school course. 

5. By concentrating the work of these three grades in relatively few centers, 
yet so placed as to be withiu walking distance for children 12 to 15 years of 
age, it would be possible to provide assembly halls, gj-mnasiums. and ample 
facilities for haudword of all kinds. Such rooms and facilities are imperatively 
needed for children in these grades, yet can not be provided on an adequate 
scale for all school buildings except at prohibitive cost. 

6. By such concentration it would also be possible to equalize classes, avoid- 
ing both very large and very small sections. In this way the efficiency of the 
work could be notably increased. 

7. By concentration of these grades it would likewise be possible to have 
teachers devote themselves to whatever line of work they can do best, thus 
reducing the pressure on teachers and improving the quality of their work. 



EFFORTS TOWAED REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 89 

8. By separating the larger from the smaller childreii the problem of dis- 
cipline would be materially simplified, since the methods suited to one age are 
not suited to another. In this way the principals would be freed from many 
needless annoyances and enabled more effectively to supervise the work of 
teaching. 

9. It is impossible, and it would be undesirable if possible, to train boys of 
12 to 15 or 16 years of age for definite trades; but it is possible and highly 
desirable to give them such general training of the hand and eye as shall 
enable them readily to adapt themselves to the requirements of whatever occu- 
pation they finally enter. This we regard as one of the most important ends to 
be obtained by the provisions of a unified course under one roof for grades 7, 
S, and 9. 

10. Finally, the plan proposed would in our opinion make for economy as 
well as efficiency. 

In the first place, assuming the number of children to remain the same, it 
would involve merely the rearrangement of certain district boundaries and the 
provision of assembly halls, gymnasiums, and workshops. But some schools 
already have certain of these facilities, and we understand that others are 
clamoring for them. Even supposing that the expense of equipping the inter- 
mediate schools would be greater than the expense for such other schools as 
would obtain these facilities anyway, it would still be true that the saving 
achieved by equalizing classes and by using the equipment for handwork up to 
its full capacity would in the end more than offset such additional expense of 
equipment. 

In the second place, if the intermediate schools should render school work 
not only more effective but also so much more attractive as to hold in school 
many who now drop out and thus increase the number of children to be edu- 
cated, we have full confidence that the people of Minneapolis would rejoice in 
the fact and consider money so sjaent well spent. 

Respectfully submitted. 

E. V. Robinson, Chairman. 

SUPERINTENDENT JORDAN'S REPORT TO THE BOARD OF EDUCATION. 

My opinion is asked by the board concerning the feasibility of the plan for 
intermediate schools submitted to the board by the educational committee of 
the commercial club. 

While there are some excellent suggestions in the plan with which schoolmen 
have long been familiar, I am opposed to its adoption by the board of educa- 
tion for the following reasons : 

1. It would involve an entire reorganization of the school system, which 
would necessarily extend over several years. 

2. It would, in my judgment, involve a large expenditure for suitable build- 
ings and would increase instead of diminish the cost of maintenance. 

3. It would make a natural stopping place for boys and girls of the ninth 
grade, and would diminish instead of increase high-school attendance. 

4. It would largely reduce the attendance in the high schools, although at 
the present time the board has already made arrangements to largely increase 
their capacity. 

5. The so-called " bridge " between courses by which a pupil could pass from 
one course to the other is not feasible if the courses be as radically different as 
I understand the plan of the club contemplates. 

6. There is no evidence whatever to show that the proposed arrangement 
will hold in school the boys and girls who now leave. 

7. While I believe in extending as far as possible industrial work in the 
schools, I do not believe that at the beginning of the seventh grade it is usually 
possible for the children or teachers to decide which of two entirely distinct 
courses — one largely literary and the other largely industrial — the pupils should 
pursue. 

I would suggest in place of this plan a general plan as follows, which, how- 
ever, will be only an experiment : 

That in the location aud erection of new buildings for the coming year the 
board have in mind the idea of massing the seventh and eighth grades as far 
as possible. In this case, if it were desirable to have two courses, a change 
could readily be made in the high-school courses so that either grade course 
could easily articulate with the corresponding course in the high school. 



90 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

So far as departmental work is concerned, which is so strongly recommended 
by the committee, it has been in use in many of the Minneapolis schools for 
years. Promotion by subjects instead of by grades need Involve no change of 
system. 

I take the liberty of adding that the difficulty, in my judgment, is not in the 
seventh, eighth, and ninth grades, but in the gi-ades below. The primary 
grades especially are so crowded that it is imix)ssible for the teacher to 
properly prepare the large number of children which she has under her charge 
for the next higher grade, and for this reason retardation, of which we hear so 
much, is most in evidence in the lower grades. With the number of children 
per teacher reduced, with a helper in each building for the children who are 
behind in their work, and with a few ungraded rooms in different parts of the 
city to which abnormal children might be sent, I think the problem of retaining 
pupils in school through the seventh and eighth grades, and even through the 
high schools, would be practically solved. 

State of Neiv York, Department of Education. Andrew S. Draper, late com- 
missioner. — Perhaps the most significant and far-reaching step toward reor- 
ganizing the school system on a functional basis which has yet been made in the 
United States was that taken by the school authorities of the State of New York 
under the distinguished leadership of Andrew S. Draper, late commissioner of 
education. Speaking upon the significance of this step, Dr. De Garmo, of 
Cornell University, recently said : 

Unless my perspective is wrong, this New York reorganization, whereby we 
can keep and even emphasize our democracy and at the same time make the 
European efficiency in secondary education possible, and can, moreover, estab- 
lish a type of industrial education of the masses suitable to our conditions, so 
different from those of Europe, will spread to the other States of our Union 
and will ultimately become the accepted type of organization of education in all 
countries that are at bottom democratic. I therefore consider this the best 
piece of constructive educational statesmanship since the time of Horace Mann. 

The plan which was adopted in September (1910), and which is being rapidly 
accepted by the schools of the State, proposes that, from the standpoint of the 
content of school work, the entire school period below the college be broken into 
three groups : The elementary group, embracing the first six years of school 
life; the intermediate group, comprising the seventh and eighth years; and 
the high-school group, covering the usual ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth 
years. Ultimately, it is thought, the ninth grade may be added to the inter- 
mediate course, though at the present time, owing to the physical organization 
of the schools, the condition of the buildings in cities and villages, and other 
local difficulties, it seems impracticable to make the shift. The character and 
scope of the change which was proposed were briefly set forth in the following 
statement, introductory to the " Course of Study and Syllabus for the Ele- 
mentary Schools" (1910): 

In determining the work of the elementary schools a six-year course has been 
prepared. This course is general in character and adapted to all children until 
that period of their development when they manifest different interests, mental 
powers, and tastes, which is usually at the age of 12. 

This six-year course is followed by an intermediate course of two years cov- 
ering the usual seventh and eighth grades and rounding out the elementary 
course. In this two-year course the work begins to differentiate. Work is 
planned which leads to the long-established high-school courses, to commercial 
courses, and to industrial courses. Certain work previously done in the high- 
school course has been brought down in this two-year course to economize the 
pupils' time, to reduce the pressure and strain under which high-school students 
have labored during their first years in high school, and to interest pupils in 
work which will induce them to remain in school for a greater number of years. 

There are, therefore, the following courses : 

I. Six-year elementary course. 

II. Intermediate course, seventh and eighth years. 



EFFORTS TOWAED REOBGANIZATION THE PEACTIOE. 91 

When, in 1905, the educational department of the State was reorganized, a 
syllabus for the elementary schools, then comprising eight grades, was adopted, 
but with the expressed belief that it should be revised at the end of five years. 
One year prior to the expiration of this five-year period Mr. Draper expressed 
his conclusions respecting the lines along which the revision of the elementary 
course should be made.^ In brief, his conclusions were : That the next syllabus 
should cover a period of six years instead of eight; that the instruction given 
all pupils during the first period should be the same, irrespective of the courses 
pursued thereafter; that near the age of 12 there should begin a differentiation 
in course of study for different groups of children; that it must not be under- 
stood that all elementary work will cease at the end of the sixth grade; and 
that the proposed six-year syllabus will articulate with the elementary work 
between that of such six years and the regular academic work and lead to 
courses in trade schools, commercial schools, and high schools of the present 
standard. 

The intermediate school, as it is developing in the State of New York, seems 
to afford a particularly fortunate opportunity, for localities desiring it, to intro- 
duce work of an industrial and vocational character. The progress of this 
tendency is sketched by Mr. Draper in the seventh annual report, issued by his 
department in 1911, under the caption " Intermediate Industrial Schools " : 

Those cities and union free-school districts which have availed themselves of 
the provisions of the education law, which provide for industrial education by 
establishing industrial or vocational schools, have admitted into such schools 
pupils who would nominally be in the seventh and eighth years of the elemen- 
tary schools. These pupils in attendance upon vocational schools are taking 
work based upon the elementary syllabus. Special provision was made in the 
i^yllabus for such pupils by intx'oducing commercial and industrial geography, 
industrial arithmetic, household economy, mechanic arts, and mechanical draw- 
ing. In developing the courses of study it was assumed that all pupils in the 
seventh and eighth years, irrespective of their future plans, would study similar 
English literature and composition, history, civics, and physiology. Discrimi- 
nation need not be made in teaching these subjects in the seventh and eighth 
grades to the various groups of pupils. Facility in the intelligent use of the 
English language, knowledge of the civic duties and privileges of the citizen, 
and definite information regarding the functions and care of the body are essen- 
tial qualities to the development of thinking boys and girls, irrespective of their 
probable vocations or the higher schools which they may attend. 

Primarily these schools do the work preparatory to the trade schools, for. 
according to the law, one of the requirements for entrance to the latter schools 
is that the pupils should have completed the general industrial schools. There 
is, however, nothing to prevent the graduates of the two-year industrial course 
from entering the regular high schools, as pupils who take industrial work in 
the seventh and eighth years of the elementary school are also required to take 
English, history, geography, physiology, and arithmetic. While the treatment 
of subject matter is somewhat different from that given the regular pupils in 
the corresponding year of the elementary schools, there need be no doubt that 
the mental development attained is as great for one class of students as for 
the other. 

At the same time it must be borne in mind that some pupils will wish to enter 
the regular secondary school. Some pupils are likely to discover that they 
have little aptitude for industrial vocations, and, furthermore, they may have 
ample means, both material and mental, to pursue the academic course and to 
postpone the time when they must think of their future vocations. Experience 
has already shown, however, that the majority of graduates of the intermedi- 
ate schools do not desire to enter the regular high schools; but in order to 
provide for those who do wish to enter such schools the board of regents has 
made a regulation covering their case. It has been provided that students 
who have completed eight years in the elementary schools — six years of which 
have been in the regular elementary work as outlined in the syllabus, and two 
years of which have been in the intermediate industrial school work corre- 
sponding to the seventh and eighth grades — may enter the regular high school. 

^ Fifth An. Rep. Ed. Dept., State of N. Y. (1909), pp. 6-8. 
5930°— 16 7 



92 EEORGANIZATIOlSr OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

There has been greater interest shown in the State in the establishment of 
these intermediate industrial schools open to pupils who are in the seventh and 
eighth years, or who are 14 years of age, than has been shown in the establish- 
ment of trade schools. This is in line with the natural development of the 
movement for industrial education. It is in the natural order of things to 
begin with those phases of a new system of education which are most needed 
and which are most logical in the complete development of an entire system. 
Everywhere it is recognized that one of the main arguments for industrial 
education is that it will provide educational facilities for children who would 
t'therwise leave school at the fourteenth year and enter unskilled industries. 
Furthermore, the problem of holding children in school until they have attain- 
ments which can never be taken away from them is worthy of great considera- 
tion. Every child should remain in the elementary school until he is prepared 
to enter a higher school or until he has a training which fits him to know what 
he wants to do in life, some preparation for his chosen vocation, as well as a 
solid grounding in the fundamentals. Industrial training aims to meet these 
conditions, and as the intermediate industrial schools increase in number, and 
as .their graduates clamor for advanced training for the industries, we may 
expect that the localities will provide for the other class of schools outlined in 
the law. 

The Philippine Islands, Department of Education. — It is interesting to observe 
how nearly the men who shaped the educational system of the Philippines have 
approached the grouping toward which American cities are now tending. The 
bureau of education of the Philippines was established in 1900 — 

to give to every inhabitant of the Philippine Islands a primary — but thoroughly 
modern — education, to thereby fit the race for participation in self-government 
and for every sphere of activity offered by the life of the Far East, and to sup- 
plant the Spanish language by the introduction of English, as a basis of educa- 
tion and a means of intercourse and communication. 

The beginning of the educational system was laid during the superintendency 
of Dr. Fred W. Atkinson, but assumed its present form of organization, which in 
its important features is doubtless permanent, under the direction of Dr. David 
P. Barrows, general superintendent of education (1903-1909).^ 

As originally planned by Dr. Barrows, provision was made for a school period 
covering 12 years, of which the elementary division embraced 6 years; the sec- 
ondary period 4 years, with the last 2 years reserved for subjects of study 
usually found in a college course — the whole leading to the granting of the 
bachelor of arts degi-ee. It was believed that the essentials of the academic 
courses, which in the United States require eight years, could be given in six 
years. Inasmuch, however, as the resources at the command of the department 
were not sufficient to guarantee to all of the children a schooling period of six 
years, this division was broken into two parts, of three years each, covered, 
respectively, by the " primary " and " intermediate " schools. 

The work of the primary school, it was expected, would in the course of 10 
years practically eliminate illiteracy among the children of the rising genera- 
tion, and would give to those who could not afford to spend more than three 
years in school a knowledge of essentials and a moral, physical, and mental 
training " sufficient to equip them for the modest demands of a modest life." 
To fill the interval in the child's training between the primary school and the 
secondary courses of the high school, as well as to enable those who could afford 
to do so to continue their work beyond the brief course of the first three years, 
the intermediate schools, covering the last three years of the elementary divi- 
sion, were devised. It was found, however, that while the academic woi'k 
deemed essential could be given in the six years covered by the primary and 
intermediate schools, it was impossible to give, in addition, as much attention to 

1 See reports of the secretary of public instruction and of the general superintendent of 
education in Reports of PhiUppinc Commiissioii. 



EFFORTS TOWARD REORGANIZATION THE PRACTICE. 93 

preparation for industrial efficiency in the primary grades as the need required. 
In 1907, therefore, the course of study was revised and one year added to the 
work of the primary school. 

As the length of the intermediate course was not changed, the elementary 
division now comprises a period of seven years, instead of six, as originally out- 
lined, although it is possible for a child who is planning for a professional life 
to limit himself to the academic work of the elementary period and thus com- 
plete the course in six years. In other departments the original time scheme 
still holds, so that the entire period of schooling provides for 12 or 13 years, 
instead of the 12 only which obtained prior to 1907. 

While provision has not yet been made, except in Manila, for the training 
corresponding to that given in the freshman and sophomore courses of American 
colleges, yet the scheme which has been planned provides that opportunity for 
work of this character shall ultimately be given in the high schools of the sev- 
eral territorial divisions. When this step shall have been taken the Philippine 
educational system will, in the essential features respecting the grouping of 
grades and their articulation, be in close correspondence with the arrangement 
which is coming rapidly to obtain in America — that of six years in the ele- 
mentary division and six or eight years in the secondary division — the whole 
leading to the " junior certificate," or possibly, as some are urging, to the bache- 
lor of arts degree. 

It may be of interest to mention the school organizations of Argen- 
tina and of Japan, which, in many respects, are similar to that 
toward which the progressive movement in this country is growing. 

Argentina, Department of Education. — For more than 50 years the National 
Government of Argentina has been actively engaged in reorganizing its educa- 
tional system and practice. In its present form the system dates back to 1884, 
when the form of organization which now obtains was instituted. The ele- 
mentary division covers six grades of one year each, and is well organized, 
especially in the city of Buenos Aires. The constitution of Argentina places 
upon the Provinces the obligation of maintaining primary schools, but, owing 
to the lack of resources which characterizes many of the Provinces, the Republic 
has been obliged to contribute to their support. The course of instruction 
among the secondary schools, which are known as liceos and colegios, covers a 
period of five years and articulates with the elementary division. The pupil 
enters at about the age of 12, and by the time he reaches 17 he is prepared for 
the professional courses, four years in length for the most part, of some one 
of the three national universities.^ 

Japan, Department of Education. — While the educational organization of 
Japan is of remote origin, extending back to the second century after Christ, 
it was not until 1871 that a department of education was created, and not until 
1886 that the foundations of the present system were laid. Since 1886 very 
earnest and intelligent attention has been given to the improvement of the 
system then established. In consequence of these modifications the system, 
articulated in all of its parts, now embraces an elementary division covering a 
minimum of six years, a secondary division of six years, and a division of 
higher education which provides the opportunity for three years of college 
work and five years of graduate work, the whole leading to the doctor's degree. 

The elementary schools, according to imperial ordinance, are designed " to 
give children the rudiments of moral education and of education specially 

^ For a survey of the educational progress in Argentina see Rep. of U. S. Comiris, rd. 
(1909), ch. 7. 



94 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

adapted to make of them good members of the community, together with such 
general knowledge and skill as are necessary for practical life, due attention 
being paid to their bodily development." These schools are divided into groups, 
" ordinary " elementary schools with a course of four years, obligatory for all 
who have reached 6 years of age; and "higher" elementary schools, wherein 
the course may be of two years, three years, or four years, as the particular 
locality determines. Inasmuch as the two-year course articulates with the 
schools of secondary grade, and as provision is made whereby pupils from 
higher elementary schools having a three or four year course are given ad- 
vanced standing in the secondary schools, it is con-ect to say that the Japanese 
system is built upon an elementary division of six years.* 

The secondary education of the counti'y is given in middle schools, girls' 
higher schools, and in some of the technical, commercial, and agricultural 
schools which have been rapidly established since the war with Russia, The 
middle schools provide for the boys and afford instruction in such arts and sci- 
ences as are necessary in the preparation for higher and special education. 
The course of study covers five years, but a supplementary course of one year 
may be added for further training in the branches already studied. The work 
in these schools is departmental. Only those students who have completed the 
four-year course of the ordinary elementary schools and the two-year course of 
the higher elementary schools, or the equivalent of such courses, and who are 
12 years of age are admitted to the. middle schools. Graduates of these schools 
of secondary rank are admitted to the " higher schools," corresponding to our 
colleges, only upon competitive examination, as these schools can accommodate 
no more than a fifth of the number of students who apply. 

The higher education of Japan is comprised in the imperial universities of 
the country and in the so-called higher schools. The latter are predominantly 
preparatory in character. The courses of study therein cover three years, and 
three lines of work are offered, each preparing for particular departments in the 
imiversities. The imperial universities have for their object " the teaching of 
.such arts and sciences as are required for the purpose of the State and the 
prosecution of original researches in such arts and sciences." Each university 
consists of a " university hall " and " colleges," the university hall being 
established for the purpose of pursuing original research and the colleges for 
instruction, theoretical and practical." 

1 For courses of study see Appendix, pp. 173-176. 

2 For a comprehensive description of tlie system as it was in 1904 see Education in 
Japan, prepared by the Department of Education (Japan), 1904, for the St. Louis Expo- 
sition. 



Chapter VI. 
THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 



Contents. — The American school system in contrast with European systems — The Ger- 
man system — The French system — The Italian system — The English system — The 
secondary schools of Ireland — The secondary schools of Scotland — The Swiss sys- 
tem — School mortality in the American system ; the studies of Thorndike, Ayres, 
Strayer — The plan adopted in Berkeley, Cal. — The difficulties met in its inaugura- 
tion ; internal organization ; principals and teachers ; legal difficulties ; congested 
schools^A campaign of publicity — Jurisdiction of departmental heads — The lower 
high school ; a transition period — Results of the arrangement — Effect on school 
attendance — Opportunity for changing the content of the courses of study. 



The public-school system, as it has developed in America, in re- 
spect to tlie grouping of years and the articulation of its chief 
divisions, is a system which is based, in the main, on remote prac- 
tices of the church, sanctioned by custom, and formulated by legal 
enactment. In so far as it sought to provide a mechanism whereby 
a child may pass, by successive steps, from division to division, on 
his way from the kindergarten to the university, the system has done 
well. Indeed, in this respect the American child, until he ultimately 
leaves the system, is never off the main track. At no step of the way 
is it incumbent upon him or his parents finally to determine his 
career. Moreover, having determined it, he can, at any step of the 
way, without loss or waste, recheck and reformulate his judgment. 
A child is limited in his advancement only by his ability and his 
application. There are no derailing switches in the American sys- 
tem, and in this particular it stands out in striking contrast with 
the systems of the Old World. 

In Germany the parent must decide before his child enters school 
whether he is to be some kind of a mechanic or small business man, or 
is to adopt for his vocation some one of the professions. If the de- 
cision favors the former, then he sends his child to the Volksschule^ 
which carries the masses of both sexes to the age of 14. At this age 
the school education of the child ceases, except that in some Prussian 
cities "middle" schools {Mittelschulen) have been established for 
those who are able to pay a yearly tuition fee of from $10 to $25, and 
which offer a course nearly parallel to the eight-year course of the 
elementary school.^ Some further instruction in direct preparation 

^A brief characterization of the Mittelschulen of Prussia is given in Rep. of U. S. Com. 
Ed. (1910), vol. 1, pp. 477-479. 

95 



90 KEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

for various trades and business occupations can be secured, also, in 
certain localities among the German States, through " continuation " 
schools, which, though independent of both the elementary schools 
and the schools of secondary grade, seek to build on the foundation 
J aid in the former. 

If, on the other hand, the parent desires his child to prepare for 
a professional career, either among the learned professions or among 
those requiring technical preparation, he fits him to enter 
some school of secondary grade {Gymndsium, Redlgymnasium^ 
or Oherrealschule) by procuring private instruction or by 
sending him to the Vorschule for a preparatory course of 
three years.^ When, at 9 or 10, the child is ready to enter a 
secondary school, to begin there a nine-year period of study, the 
parent must define still more narrowly the future of his child. If 
he decides upon the Gyinnccsium^ the child's course will be a classical 
one, in which the study of Latin and Greek predominates; if the 
RealgyTnnasiuirb^ Greek will be replaced by the study of modern 
languages, supplemented by mathematics and science; and if the 
Oherrealschule be selected, French will be substituted for Latin, and 
only modern subjects taught, the main object being to prepare the 
pupil for doing original work in mathematics and the natural 
sciences. Having chosen among schools, the option is ended, for the 
curriculum in each is so heavy that the pupil never attempts to take 
studies outside the prescribed course. For parents who live in 
localities where but one kind of school is to be found there is really 
no choice. 

In France also the universities and secondary schools are closely 
related, the two orders of institutions forming a continuous and 
complete system of liberal and professional education, in which the 
secondary schools embrace two cycles of work — one of four years, be- 
ginning at 11 years of age; the other of three, terminating with the 
granting of the bachelor's degree — and the whole being the necessary 
preliminary for admission to the specialized course of the universi- 
ties and the great technical schools.^ The elementary division, on 
the other hand, comprises the primary schools, covering the ages 
from 6 to 12, which terminate with an examination entitling the 
successful candidate to a certificate of primary studies that exempts 
the holder from the obligation to attend school. Beyond these pri- 
mary schools lie the higher primary schools (12 to 16), with a course 

1 It should be noted that a relatively small number leave the elementary schools each 
year at 9 or 10 years of age to enter the various secondary schools. In 190S-9, of an 
enrollment in the elementary schools of 228,455 in Berlin, 2,234 made such change. See 
Rep. of U. S. Com. Ed. (1910), vol. 1, p. 469. 

- See Rep. of U. 8. Com. Ed. (1902), vol. 1, p. 686 ; also ch. 15 for a detailed account of 
the reforms of 1902 in secondary education ; also Compayre, in Educational Review, Teb., 
1903. 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL, 97 

covering three years, to which a fourth may be added, open to candi- 
dates above 13 years of age, for pupils who have secured the certifi- 
cate of primary studies or who can pass an examination. The only 
point of contact between the elementary division and that of the 
secondary school is that pupils from the higher primary schools can 
enter the section of the first cycle of secondary work (section B), 
in which neither Latin nor Greek is taught. 

Inasmuch, however, as the secondary schools are not free schools 
and as the certificate of primary studies, originally granted to stimu- 
late interest in the primary schools, is secured by many at the mini- 
mum age of 11, and as, furthermore, the compulsory education period 
does not extend beyond 13 and is not rigidly enforced, the masses 
drop out of school in great numbers, few availing themselves of the 
coordination of the two divisions. Eecently, how^ever, through the 
articulation of the higher primary schools and the colleges that are 
of secondary rank, but established by local authorities and main- 
tained in part by the State, a gradual approach of the primary and 
secondary divisions is observable. Although these colleges follow the 
same official programs as the lycees (the typical secondary schools of 
France), few of them offer the full course of instruction, so that they 
have formed a sort of inferior order of secondary schools, or a 
preparatory stage to the upper cycle (or section) of the lycees.^ 

Secondary education in Italy also is lacking in coordination with 
that of the elementary division. It comprises two main subdivisions : 
First, those schools wherein education of a technical character is 
given; second, the classical schools (gymnasia), that articulate with 
the universities. Pupils enter the latter at 8 or 9 years of age. 
After a course lasting five years they are prepared for the lycee, 
which is simply a school in which the classical studies begun in the 
gymnasium can be continued for three years more, thus preparing the 
pupil for the university. Pupils enter the gymnasien with the equiv- 
alent of the first three years of work given in the elementary schools. 
This preparation is secured from private tutors or in private schools, 
as they rarely enter from the public elementary school itself. While 
elementary schooling in Italy is secular, obligatory, and gratuitous 
from the sixth to the ninth year, yet the apathy among the masses is 
so great that but a small percentage of those who complete the com- 
pulsory three-year period finish the sixth school year, which is the 
highest in the elementary schools.^ 

In England there are no free secondary schools,, and but few where 
the charges are within the reach of any but well-to-do people. There 

^ See Current Tendencies in Secondary and Higher Education in FroMce, in Rep. of U. S. 
Com. Ed. (1910), vol. 1, pp. 413-417. 

2 In 1906 only a trifle over 7 per cent, according to Monroe in Bep. of U. 8. Com. Ed. 
(1906),vol. 1, p. 77. 



98 REORGANIZATION OP THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSIEJVJ. 

is no English counterpart to the free public high school of America. 
In consequence a secondary education is beyond the reach of the 
great proportion of the poorer people. A small proportion of ambi- 
tious children from the public elementary schools, however, are en- 
abled to secure secondary schooling in favored localities through a 
system of free scholarships obtained by competitive examination. 
However, the endowments which produce these scholarships are scat- 
tered over England capriciously, as the accident of the residence of 
ancient donors or the appreciation of landed property may have 
determined.^ Moreover, the scholarships are often competed for and 
obtained by the rich and liberally taught children, who look upon 
the scholarship as an honor, and thus the poorer and less fortunate 
children are crowded out. Some school boards appropriate a sum 
of money sufficient to secure attendance of their brightest pupils at 
endowed schools, but this again is appropriated on competitive 
examination. So difficult is it for the poor boy to secure such educa- 
tion that the number to be found in the two great English universi- 
ties — Oxford and Cambridge — who have secured their elementary 
preparation in these State-aided schools is but 1 per cent of the total 
university enrollment, and yet 85 per cent of the entire population 
depends upon these elementary schools for education. In other 
words, the 15 per cent of population that are financially able to 
dispense with State-aid schools contribute 99 per cent of the uni- 
versity enrollment.^ 

The intermediate (secondary) schools of Ireland, like the sec- 
ondary schools of England, do not form a link between the public 
elementary and higher institutions. In both countries they offer 
distinct courses, parallel in a sense to the elementary school, but ex- 
tending beyond it. Again, it is difficult for the children of poor 
parents in each to avail themselves of its advantages. 

In Scotland, on the other hand, the secondary school, as a rule, 
may be said to be continuous with the elementary school, connecting 
the latter with the university, somewhat after the arrangement in 
America, though unlike in that children attending such schools are 
obliged to pay fees. It should be said, however, that there is no 
country in the world that is so well provided as Scotland with 
scholarships, or bursaries, as they are called, to enable the poor 
students to attend universities and secondary schools.^ 

The only system in Europe which is at all comparable to the 
American system, in respect to the important place granted to the 
primary school, is that which has been developed among the Cantons 

1 Sharpless, English Education, p. 78. 

2 Ibid., pp. 80, 81. 

^ Rep. of U.S. Com. Ed. (1910), vol. 1, pp. 535-537 ; gives an account also of the reform 
in the bursary system. 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, GAL. 99 

of Switzerland. As in America, the primary school, which every 
Swiss child must attend for from 6 to 8 or 9 years, is the common 
trunk from which all other schools branch. Like the American 
system, again, nowhere are found preparatory grades connected di- 
rectly with secondary institutions. As a consequence, the child of 
the wealthy parent and the child of the parent who is poor attend 
the same school and mingle freely, without regard to pecuniary con- 
dition or social rank. 

With the possible exception of Switzerland, the school systems of 
Europe ^ are broken into two great divisions, one comprising the ele- 
mentary schools, the other the secondary schools and the universities. 
Both divisions reach down to the age of school commencement, and, 
within the scope common to both, are parallel to each other ; yet, in 
respect to relationship, they remain practically separate and dis- 
tinct. By their origin and history the universities and secondary 
schools of these systems are closely related, the two institutions form- 
ing a continuous and complete system of liberal and professional edu- 
cation. In these systems the secondary division of education is not 
regarded as a second stage in a continuous process, as with us, but 
rather as an order of education which, coupled with the university, 
is superior in rank to that embraced in schools of elementary grade. 
This distinction arises from the belief that those who are destined for 
professional careers and for leadership in the State should be edu- 
cated from their earliest years in a different manner and in a differ- 
ent class of subjects from the laboring masses. Under such systems, 
moreover, the entire future of the the child must be determined at 
an age when little can be known of his tastes and aptitudes and long 
before he himself is competent to form a judgment. He is thus com- 
pletely at the mercy of others, and in the event a mistake is made is 
without recourse. 

The trend of education in America during the colonial period, and 
well down to the middle of the next century, was in the same direction. 
There were many indications that as school practices crystallized 
into organized systems in America the same lines of demarcation 
would be drawn. The relatively unimportant place held during 
these periods by the elementary school, the fact that education was 
looked upon as affecting the individual rather than as a matter of 
concern to the State, the length of time required to develop a feeling 
of nationality, the dominance of the university and its demand for 
institutions preparatory in character, the influence of European mod- 
els and precedents — all tended to make America slavish in its imita- 

^ For administrative purposes there are three divisions : Elementary, secondary, and 
higher, or " superior " education. 



100 EEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

tion of the school systems of the Old World. Fortunately, however, 
opposing influences were at work which culminated about the middle 
of the last century in a sharp but victorious struggle, out of which 
has come a public-school system completely democratized in respect 
to providing a direct connection between its two poles for every 
child who wills it, whether rich or poor. 

Despite the fact, however, that America has developed a straight 
path between the elementary school and the university, recent studies 
of school attendance show that very few of those who enter the 
primary grades ever reach the university. The first serious study of 
school elimination, made in accordance with modern statistical meth- 
ods, was that by Prof. Edward L. Thorndike, of Columbia Uni- 
versity, in 1907.^ This bulletin started a discussion which led to a 
number of important investigations in the same field, the two most 
valuable being that by Dr. Leonard P. Ayres, of the Russell Sage 
Foundation, published in 1909,- and that by Prof. George Drayton 
Strayer, of Columbia University, published in 1911.^ 

In attempting to determine what i^roportion of the children who 
enter our schools drop out before completing the course, and the 
points in our system where this elimination is greatest, a different 
method of estimating the number of pupils annually entering school 
was used in each of these three studies. Thorndike assumed that 
the average enrollment of pupils in the first three grades would 
approximate the number of pupils entering the first grade in a 
given year. Ayres held that the number beginning school each year 
is approximately equal to the " average of the generations of the 
ages 7 to 12 " in the school membership of the system under con- 
sideration.* Strayer, on the other hand, built up his investigation 
on the assertion that — 

the generation of children entering school in any one year is best represented 
by the largest age group, which is precisely a generation of children, and since 
it is the lai'gest, it probably approximates more closely than any other that 
generation which has entered the schools during the current year.s 

In trying to determine the general tendency of the American 
public-school system respecting elimination, it will be instructive to 
compare the conclusions reached by these investigators. By way of 
explanation, it should be noted that Ayres and Strayer have not cor- 
rected for pupils who are repeating their work ; further, that where 
the numbers exceed 100 in each case the presence of repeaters is 

1 Thorndike, The Elimination of Pupils from School, Bu. of Ed., Bui. No. 4, 1907. 

^ Ayres, Laggards in Our Schools. 

^ Strayer, Age and Orade Census of Schools and Colleges, Bu. of Ed., Bui. No. 5, 1911. 

* Ayres, Laggards in Our Schools, p. 52. 

* Strayer, Age and Orade Census of Schools and Colleges, p. 12. 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 



101 



indicated. The school life of every 100 children annually entering 
the first grade follows: 



Pupils remaining in each grade out of those entering first grade. 





Elementary grades. 


High-school years. 




4J 


§ 


i 


g 




."H 

CO 


J3 

a 


.1 


Ut 

5 


■6 
g 

02 


'6 


a 

s 
^ 


Thomdike ' 


100 
173 
150 
140 


100 
129 
120 
115 


100 
128 
115 
110 


90 
120 
110 
110 


81 
106 
100 

95 


68 
90 

85 
85 


54 
71 
65 
75 


40 
61 
50 
60 


27 
40 
35 
45 


17 
19 
20 
30 


12 

14 
14 
20 


8 


Ayres 2 


10 




10 


Strayer3|Qj^3j^-. --•••--■•-- 


16 







1 Thorndike, The Elimination of Pupils from School, p. 11. 

2 Ayres, Laggards in Our Schools, p. 57. 

3 Strayer, ^^e amcZ Grode Census of Schools and Colleges, p. 135. 

Noting as an exception Thorndike's belief that school elimination 
begins early in the primary grades, it is possible to summarize the 
important conclusions these investigators reached respecting the 
general tendency of the system, thus: Of every 100 children an- 
nually entering the first grade of our schools, practically all will 
reach the end of the fifth grade. Between this point and the first 
year of the high school, from 60 to 67 per cent of those reaching the 
fifth grade will be lost, leaving but from 17 to 25 of the original 100 
pupils who will reach the second year of the high school. Out of 
this number, only from 8 to 10 will finally complete the high-school 
course. Studies which have been made in California show that of 
the 8 or 10 who graduate from the high school, fewer than 3 enter 
normal schools, colleges, or other schools of a grade beyond that of 
the high school, and of this number fewer than 1.5 remain to the 
end of the course. 

A system in which the divisions, elementary, high school, and col- 
lege, are so articulated as to permit each division to possess a dis- 
tinctive function and a distinctive content shaped to meet such domi- 
nating purpose, would go far toward holding in the system the great 
numbers who are now falling by the wayside. The common arrange- 
ment, of assigning eight years to the period of elementary study and 
four years to that of secondary instruction, offers no such oppor- 
tunity. Eight years, in the life of the child, beginning with the age 
of 6, carries him beyond the time necessary to acquire the tools of an 
education, and beyond the first natural division in his life, viz, that 
which comes with the dawn of adolescence. Its expiration finds him, 
if he has made normal progress through the grades, fully two years 
advanced into a period where nature demands a very different con- 
tent and treatment from that in the period when the rudiments of 



102 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

education are being acquired. While the advent of adolescence 
brings no greater break than does the change of night into day, yet 
as night differs from day, imperceptible though the transition from 
one to the other may be, so the characteristics of the child differ from 
those of the youth. The school system, in its organic form, and in 
the articulation of its parts, completely ignores the significant physi- 
ological and psychical changes which are ushered in with the advent 
of adolescence. That this phenomenon in human development is 
ignored by the system accounts in a very large degree for the rapid 
elimination in the upper grammar grades; nor will this loss be 
greatly decreased until an intelligent attempt is made by the educa- 
tors to shape the system and the content of the courses to meet the 
needs that demand satisfaction. 

That the present arrangement is not adequately accomplishing this 
is clear furthermore, not alone from the loss in the upper grades, but 
from that in the first year of the high school as well. Ayres claims 
that more than half of those enrolling in the ninth year never enter 
the tenth year. Whether this proportion be exact or not, educators 
know that the loss at this point is very large, greater, in fact, than 
that between the eighth grade and the high school. The reason is 
obvious, namely, the articulation of the two divisions is an artificial 
one, and one that does not meet the need for a gradual transition. 
The teachers in the two divisions are different in type ; the adminis- 
trative methods are radically different; the subjects of study in the 
early years of the latter division are not such as appeal to the natural 
interest of the pupils; in short, no proper transition has been pro- 
vided between the one and the other and, in consequence, the pupil 
frequently becomes disheartened and drops out, with the conscious- 
ness of having failed. In many instances it is a failure for which the 
system in its blindness is responsible. Limiting the elementary 
division to six j^ears and throwing in a three or four year period be- 
tween the termination of the elementary division and the beginning 
of the upper half of the secondary period, which would provide a 
careful transition from the one to the other, would surely go far to- 
ward holding in school those who, at this point, are dropping out on 
account of failure to make an adjustment to the new conditions that 
must be met in the high school. In the reorganization plan under 
which the school department of Berkeley, Cal., is now operating, an 
attempt is made to provide such a period of transition and, at the 
same time, to secure a grouping of the several grades which shall be 
based on function rather than uj^on chance. 

This plan, which was inaugurated in January, 1910, proposed that 
the 12 grades, or years, be broken into three groups: The first, ele- 
mentary, to comprise the first six years of school life: the second, the 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 103 

lower high school, to comprise the seventh, eighth, and ninth years; 
and the third, the upper high school, to embrace all pupils of the 
tenth, eleventh, and twelfth years. In its ideal form, the plan re- 
quired separate buildings for the elementary division, a separate 
building for the lower high-school grades at the center of each group 
of elementary schools, and an upper high-school building at the 
geographical center of the entire city, and thus at a point equally 
convenient to all. In practice, it was found that the buildings that 
were suited in size and equipment to the work of the lower high 
schools were not in every case situated at points altogether central and 
convenient to all of a given group of elementary schools; hence ob- 
jection was at once made by some of the parents concerned. 

When first suggested the plan contemplated transferring all of 
the children in the first six grades from the central or lower high- 
school buildings and distributing them among the elementary schools 
of the respective attendance districts. It was found, however, that 
such action would require that the little children who were living 
within the shadows of the central school would be obliged to attend 
schools situated at prohibitive distances. Two ways of meeting 
this serious objection to the plan were considered: First, retaining 
a sufficient number of rooms for the use of the first two or three 
grades and transferring the entire enrollment of the fourth, fifth, 
and sixth grades; second, retaining six rooms, one for each of the 
first six grades, to accommodate those children only who resided 
in close proximity to the school in question. The latter method 
was adopted, and has worked satisfactorily. 

Another serious difficulty developed in carrying the plan into 
effect — namely, the attachment that the children of the upper grades 
had formed for their respective schools, and their disinclination 
to leave their home school and the teachers with whom they were 
acquainted until their eighth-grade course was completed. This 
difiiculty was met by requiring only those children who had com- 
pleted the work of the sixth grade in the outlying buildings to 
come in to the central school. The grades which had already en- 
tered upon the work of the seventh and eighth years were per- 
mitted to choose whether to remain in their home schools or be 
transferred to the central school, such decision to be determined by 
majority vote of the class, after conference with the parents, and 
after the educational advantages to be obtained at the lower high 
schools had been pointed out to them. In several instances classes 
chose to enter the central schools immediately, but in other instances 
the feeling for the home school was so strong that the children re- 
mained until the completion of their eighth year's work. A transi- 
tion period of one and one-half years, or three terms, however, 



104 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

brought them all into the central schools, and without the necessity 
of distasteful compulsion. 

Various difficulties arose in connection with the internal organi- 
zation, especially as it affected the personnel of the school corps. 
The plan required that the principals of the lower high schools 
should hold certificates of high-school grade, and that the teachers 
of such schools should also be teachers empowered by law to do 
high-school work. A further difficulty developed respecting the 
salaries of the principals of the elementary schools. The salary 
schedule under which the principals work bases salary upon the 
grade of the building, which, in turn, is determined by the number 
of rooms occupied. For instance, a 16-room building falls into one 
class, whereas a 15-room building is in the class below, in respect 
to the principal's salary. 

The first was met by a transfer of principals, an arrangement 
that was made easy because of the fine spirit of the men concerned. 
In respect to the standard of certification required of the teachers, 
little difficulty was experienced in practice, because those teachers 
at the central schools who had been doing successful work in the 
seventh and eighth grades were retained in their positions, and the 
high-school requirement was made to apply to new teachers coming 
into the department, who for the most part were to be assigned to 
the ninth grade, which in accordance with California law is the 
first year of the high-school division. The salary schedule w^as so 
amended as to place all teachers of the lower high schools teaching 
on grammar-grade certificates on the grammar-school salary sched- 
ule, and all teachers teaching on high -school certificates on the salary 
schedule of the high school. The third objection from the corps 
Avas met by a liberal action on the part of the board of education 
to the effect that the principals of the elementary schools should 
not suffer a loss in salary on account of a decrease in attendance 
during the period of transition. In these ways the objections to 
the plan growing out of the personal interests of the school corps 
were met. 

Still another objection was raised — namely, that such an arrange- 
ment would l>e in conflict with the State laws, vrhich view the ele- 
mentary-school district and the high-school district as two separate 
corporate entities, the one being represented by an elementary school 
board of education and the other by a high-school board. Although 
the personnel of the two boards is the same, yet, under the law, the 
bodies are separate and distinct. The law provides, furthermore, 
that funds used for the maintenance of the elementaiy school, on the 
one hand, and the high school, on the other, must be kept separate, 
both as regards income and expenditure. Again, the school law pro- 
vides that certain subjects shall be taught in the elementary school 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 105 

and certain others in the high school; the State also has adopted a 
series of textbooks, which must be used in the elementary schools; 
furthermore, it decrees that no teacher who does not possess a high- 
school certificate issued by the State authorities shall teach a class 
of high-school grade. These objections proved not to be serious; 
for, by being careful to use the State textbooks in the seventh and 
eighth grades of the lower high schools ; to keep the record of attend- 
ance of the seventh and eighth grades separate from that of the 
ninth grade, upon each of which the apportionment of the State 
school fund in part is based; and to assign to the ninth grade only 
those teachers in the lower high school who were teaching on high- 
school certificates, it was easy to carry the plan into effect, even under 
a law which did not contemplate such an arrangement. 

A final difficulty arose, due to congestion at the central schools 
owing to the growth of the city. The capacity margin of the entire 
department has now become exhausted, and the people must take 
steps toward providing for the growth of the future. Recognizing 
that the plan proposed involved inconvenience, it was necessary to 
build up in the community a strong sentiment in support of it before 
the board of education could be expected to take affirmative action. 
A period of two months, therefore, prior to its adoption by the board 
was devoted to a campaign of publicity. Many meetings were held 
by improvement clubs, mothers' clubs, parent-teachers' associations, 
and other civic bodies for its examination. Even the churches cooper- 
ated in the effort to place before all of the people interested in the 
schools the details of the plan. A printed explanation of the con- 
templated scheme was placed in every home in the city. Descriptive 
articles appeared almost daily in the columns of the local press. 
More than 30 meetings were held among the citizens for a discussion 
of the plan, during each of which full opportunity was given for 
the presentation and frank discussion of the objections. In conse- 
quence of this period of discussion the objections were so far over- 
come that practically all of the organized bodies of citizens indorsed 
the proposed arrangement; whereupon, with complete unanimity, 
the board of education authorized its inauguration, knowing that the 
plan would be given sympathetic trial by the people. 

The form of the organization under which the lower high schools 
were established was that commonly found in high schools through- 
out the country, embracing, so far as the corps of instructors is con- 
cerned, a principal and teachers selected to combine sympathy with 
children of the adolescent age, and a wider scholastic outlook than 
ordinarily is to be found among teachers limited to a preparation 
for grammar-school work. As in the upper high school, classes are 
organized on the basis of subjects rather than upon the basis of 



106 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

school age. Promotion, as in the upper high school, is likewise upon 
subjects and credits received, rather than by the class system which 
prevails in the grades. It is also possible in these schools, within 
limits, to elect courses, on the assumption that it is inadvisable to 
i-equire all children entering the adolescent period to pursue the 
same studies. 

To bring about an organic unity between the work of these lower 
high schools and that of the upper high school, the jurisdiction of the 
department heads of the latter has been extended downward, to in- 
clude kindred lines of work begun there. Thus, for instance, the 
head of the history department supervises the work in the general 
field of history, from the seventh grade, inclusive, upward; so with 
the head of the department of mathematics, of science, of English, 
of foreign languages, of commercial work, and of mechanic arts. 
In two departments — those of drawing and household arts — ^the work 
throughout the entire department, including the three divisions, is 
under the same supervision, respectively. In music, the work of the 
supervisor of the elementary grades has been extended upward, to 
include that of the lower high schools. The elementary schools, 
except for the special subjects of music, drawmg, and household 
arts, are under the general control of a supervisor of elementary 
grades, who is responsible for the work of the schools embracing 
the first six years. Aside from offering electives within certain 
limitations, a dilTerentiation has been made in the work of the lower 
liigh schools themselves. In three of the schools courses are dupli- 
cated, but in the fourth school commercial and industrial courses 
are emphasized, as this particular school is situated in the industrial 
section of the city. 

In this general arrangement the lower high school is viewed as 
providing a three-year period between the elementary school, on the 
one hand, and the upper high school, on the other, which should be 
looked upon primarily as a transition period from the one to the 
other in everything except the content of the school courses. Under 
the traditional organization the break between the elementary school 
and the high school is a distinct one for the child. Standards of 
scholarship, methods of instruction, and methods of administration 
are all different. In short, under the customary procedure, the child 
enters a new world, and in all of these important particulars without 
preparation for it. The lower high school provides a three-year 
period, during M^hich the chief objective in matters pertaining to 
school administration is that of a gradual transition from the ma- 
chinery of the elementary school to that of the high school. 

This transition can be brought about in several ways. The 
teachers of the high school are of necessity specialists; they have 
come into the high school after having taken undergraduate and 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 107 

graduate courses, but are, for the most part, without technical train- 
ing in teaching. The methods which they tend to pursue are the 
only methods with which they are familiar, namely, those which are 
prevalent among university professors, and which, obviously, are 
poorly adapted to high-school instruction. The point of view of such 
teachers tends to be that wherein the subject and its content are of 
paramount importance, often overshadowing interest in the pupil 
himself. Such conditions and such teachers are bad enough for the 
older pupils, but positively harmful to those coming in from teachers 
of a totally different type respecting preparation, sympathj^, outlook, 
and training. By selecting teachers for the lower high school who 
first of all have had successful experience in teaching in the grades, 
and who in the second place have taken enough advanced academic 
work to broaden their horizon somewhat beyond that of the grade 
teacher, the ideal combination is secured. Furthermore, by insisting 
that such teachers be assigned at least two different subjects rather 
than one, as often obtains in the larger high schools, the tendency 
toward undue specialization in those early years can be checked. 

Again, in the handling of the study period a transition can be 
effected through graduating the degree of independence granted to 
the pupil. Thus in the first two years of the lower high-school 
course it has been found desirable for each child to devote one half 
of a given period otherwise employed in recitation work to study 
under the direction of the teacher and to give the other half to the 
usual methods of the recitation. To assume that a pupil accustomed 
to the close supervision of the grade teacher on entering the high 
school will immediately make proper use of his free time is clearly 
false and one which undoubtedly is accountable for a very large per- 
centage of high-school mortality. 

In another particular the grammar-grade pupil on entering the 
traditional high school finds himself in confusion, because of the 
number of teachers with whom he comes in contact daily. He misses 
the one teacher to whom he was responsible in the grades and to 
whom he could go for advice respecting the perplexities of his school 
life. This is clearly the chief danger which attends departmental 
work. It can be eliminated only through shaping up the machinery 
of the school with this objective specifically in mind. It is serious 
enough among older pupils of high-school age, but doubly so with 
those just coming in from the grades, accustomed as they are to a 
close personal contact with their teachers. 

The transition from the one-teacher regimen to one wherein there 
are many can be effected in the lower high schools through insisting 
that the work of the seventh-grade classes shall be handled in each 
case by not more than two teachers, one of whom shall be designated 

5930°— 16 8 



108 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

the " advisory teacher," and upon whom shall rest the final responsi- 
bility for the progi^ess of the individuals committed specifically to her 
keeping. If too much home work is being given, it is her business to 
regulate the matter. If a given pupil is beginning to fall behind in 
the work of his class or subject, it is the duty of the advisory teacher 
to promptly modify conditions. By the arrangement, therefore, of 
limiting the number of teachers of each beginner to two and gradu- 
ally increasing this number as the pupil becomes more mature and 
better adjusted to the requirements of the school, and by the further 
expedient of vesting the responsibility for his progress in an ad- 
visory teacher, the chief danger of the departmental method of 
school organization is eliminated. 

Aside from providing a three-year period of transition from the 
elementary school on the one hand to the more highly specialized 
high school on the other, there are a number of significant possibili- 
ties growing out of this plan of school organization. First of all, in 
respect to the elementary division: By reducing the elementary- 
school course from eight years to six there is presented the oppor- 
tunity of condensing a course which many educational leaders now 
contend contains much padding. The period of the elementary 
school, if viewed from the standpoint of function, should be that 
given over primarily to securing literacy. Observation of the best 
schools makes it clear that this can be secured in six years at most, 
if the work be properly systematized and handled under advan- 
tageous conditions. The tasks of learning to read, to write a legible 
and fairly rapid hand, to acquire the written forms necessary to 
express the oral vocabulary, and to acquire the simple elements of 
the arithmetic used in the household are not tasks which should in 
themselves demand the attention of the pupil beyond the first six 
years of his school life. Bringing together the pi-ime essentials of 
the prevalent eight-year elementary course and organizing the same, 
shaping up thereby a six-year course, will stren^hen the work of the 
elementary school. It will cause the children to feel that they are 
doing real work. Assuming that due regard is paid to health condi- 
tions, and assuming also the presence of efficient instructors, such a 
body of actual essentials can be given in six years to the ordinary 
normal child without strain. 

Furthermore, by breaking our elementary and secondary divisions 
into three groups, or cycles, of work, the standards of accomplish- 
ment for the lower grades will be lifted. The history of school 
progress shows that the necessity of passing from a lower to a higher 
division has always tended to stimulate the work of the former. 
Thus, for example, the fact that high schools have been required 
to meet university standards has unquestionably raised the scholar- 
ship in the high schools. Likewise the fact that our grammar schools 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BEEKELEY, CAL. 109 

have promoted to the high school, and that in the latter there is a 
separate and distinct body of experts, in a measure passing judgment 
upon the work of the schools of lower grade, has tended toward 
betterment; but in this instance too frequently the strain of improv- 
ing the work has been limited to the last year immediately preceding 
the high school, rather than distributed over the entire eight-year 
period of elementary work. Even though no direct or specific de- 
mands be made, this arrangement of introducing a cycle of work, 
embracing the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades, will push further 
down the stimulating effect. 

Congregating the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades in separate 
buildings removes the older boys and girls from the young children, 
which is a decided advantage to both. With the limited playground 
that unfortunately obtains in most of the schools of our land, either 
the older children are prohibited from playing the rougher games 
which their natures crave and their muscles demand, or else, through 
fear of bodily injury the little children are crowded to one side, and 
fail to secure that opportunity for free exercise without restraint 
that they most need. Again, through such segregation, the atten- 
tion of the principal and teachers can be centered upon the needs 
of these young children without having to divert the same to those 
difficult problems of management, of instruction, and of control 
which the adolescent child of necessity raises. Too frequently the 
difficulties and problems of the older children absorb the attention 
of the principal and his faculty to the neglect of the younger 
children, and in consequence there is serious weakness in the first 
period of school life. 

By increasing the number of children attending the first six years 
at the elementary school, incident to eliminating the same from the 
lower high-school building, it will frequently be possible to secure a 
sufficient number to permit the realization of the ideal classification 
in the elementary schools, or an approximation thereto. An attend- 
ance of 400 children in a given school of this character will justify 
the assignment of 12 teachers. This will give to each teacher not 
more than a single division of children. A teacher working under 
such conditions should properly be held responsible for highly satis- 
factory results. 

Even more helpful and significant is this plan of organization in 
the work of the second cycle — namely, the seventh, eighth, and ninth 
grades. In a city of some size, through congregating the children of 
these grades, it is possible to collect at one point a sufficient number 
to justify offering a choice in the subjects of study. Obviously, it 
would be impossible to offer any option in the usual ward school, in 
which are to be found the full eight grades. Enrollment rapid!;/ 



110 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

diminishes as one proceeds upward in the grades of our public 
schools. The eighth grade is always very much smaller than preceding 
ones, and frequently, in a given school, is only large enough to main- 
tain one or tw^o classes. Therefore it would not be practicable, from 
the standpoint of expense alone, to offer such grades, scattered 
as they are among the several schools of a city department, any 
variety in subjects. Such opportunity can be provided only where a 
sufficient number are grouped together to make each class large 
enough to justify the assignment of a teacher. There can be little 
question that, by the time young people have reached the upper 
grades of the grammar school, their tastes, aptitudes, and abilities 
are sufficiently developed to warrant an opportunity for some selec- 
tion of subjects. To force all children in the seventh and eighth 
grades, at a time when they are entering a period of school work 
which should be characterized by very different ideals and goals from 
those which obtain in the first division, to take the same work is 
clearly w^rong. Uniformity is a curse under which the schools have 
too long been laboring, and should never be insisted upon beyond 
that period in which the " tools " of an education are given. 

An organization of a school system whereby the upper grades of 
the grammar schools are brought together in numbers is the only 
arrangement, within reasonable limits of expense, through which 
variety can be secured. 

Such an arrangement makes possible a greater flexibility in the 
methods of promotion, for it enables a school to evaluate the work of 
the pupil and his progress, in terms of the school course by subjects 
and points, rather than by the traditional class system of promotion. 
The "lock step" in education has been justly condemned as being 
mechanical and positively harmful to the individual pupil who varies 
necessarily from the theoretical average that the teacher establishes. 
In recent years different methods of promotion have been attempted 
in the interest of such pupils. The Batavia system, the Cambridge 
plan, the plan of ungraded classes, the arrangement in force in the 
Portland (Oreg.) schools, besides variations now in effect in Chicago, 
111. ; North Denver, Colo. ; St. Louis, Mo. ; Oakland, Cal., and other 
cities, are all efforts toward bringing about greater flexibility, thereby 
rendering the schools more helpful to the individual pupil. Each 
of these plans contains excellent features, but none fully reaches the 
difficulty. Progress by subjects, however, goes further, and gives 
every individual a chance to move forward as rapidly as his abilities 
and his Avill determine. Under such a method some pupils may 
choose to take three subjects, some four, others five, thereby individ- 
ually determining the length of the period necessary to complete the 
work of a giAen cycle. 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY^ GAL. Ill 

By bringing together a number of pupils of the ages and attain- 
ments of those in the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades the school 
principal and his faculty have an opportunity of initiating a splen- 
did work through the student-body organization that can be formed. 
Such a plan provides an opportunity for developing the social con- 
sciousness of the individual, and teaching him through it how to com- 
port himself among his fellows, and at an age when the instinct for 
establishing social relationships runs high. Perhaps no lesson is of 
greater importance to the individual than that of developing the 
ability to get on with his fellows without making a compromise with 
his moral standards. The activities coming naturally through par- 
ticipation in a live student-body organization provide unusual oppor- 
tunities for teaching such lessons concretely, naturally, and therefore 
effectively. Furthermore, by means of a student-body organization 
high standards of conduct and character can be secured and a gen- 
eral school morale developed as in no other way. It has been found 
that a measure of student government can thereby be introduced-witli 
decided advantage to those who participate in the work and with 
beneficial reaction upon the tone of the school. It has been observed 
that students who, in the lower high school, by means of such activi- 
ties develop confidence in themselves very quickly and forcibly exert 
their influence upon the student body in the upper high school. In 
short, with such an internal organization of the students as this 
opportunity provides, an unsuspected and undeveloped field exists, 
wherein can be secured highly significant results of a very practical 
character. 

Again, a segmentation of the parts of the public-school system in 
the manner here indicated fully justifies the paying of high-school 
salaries to all the teachers in this second division who have certificates 
of high-school grade. Where this is done it becomes possible to com- 
mand the services of young men who are college graduates, and who 
are willing to enter these grades as teachers and to remain therein 
for a time. Already one-fourth of the total number of teachers in 
the lower high schools are young men of fine character and ability. 
As vacancies arise in the teaching force of the grades, the percentage 
of male teachers will be increased until the sexes are about evenly 
balanced. The customary arrangement, wherein the seventh and 
eighth grades are grouped with the elementary division,. and wherein 
the elementary-school salary schedule only applies, offers no induce- 
ment to such men. In consequence, in most communities throughout 
the United States the sorry spectacle can be seen of generations of 
boys and girls passing through the first eight years of school life 
without at any time ever having come under the influence of a male 
teacher. It frequently happens that a child is never under the 



112 KEOKGAJS'IZATIOJM Oi^' THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SVSTKM. 

instruction of a man until he reaches the high school, and, as half of 
the school population of the land never enters the high school, it is 
clear that the criticism that our school system is tending toward a 
feminization of the children is a just one. 

Through a grouping of the grades into three cycles, it would seem 
that the work of the last, the upper high school, could be made more 
intensive than it usually is, with higher standards of scholarship and 
more rigid requirements than universally obtain, and this without 
working a hardship upon the young people who enter the school ; for 
it would seem that, if the work in the lower high school be carefully 
and efficiently done, the incoming students will have developed a 
much more serious attitude toward their work, will have oriented 
themselves better so far as their subjects are concerned, and that the 
break Avill not be so great or so discouraging as with the plan under 
which we have traditionally worked. 

Moreover, the students entering the upper high school will have 
developed in the lower high school a greater cohesion than now 
obtains. Under the customary plan, pupils dribble into the high 
school in small numbers and from many schools. They are lacking 
in anything approaching community feeling or a feeling of gi'oup 
resiDonsibility. They have had no experience in organized action 
and are not conscious of their individual responsibility in contribut- 
ing to the establishment of a student-body sentiment that shall be 
high and lofty in its purpose and in its influence. In consequence, 
it is difficult for the student body of the school to assimilate such 
pupils properly and completely, and if the existing school morale be 
low, these incomers are in no way fitted to lift it. With three years 
of community life at the centers wherein the administrative methods 
are shaped to develop this responsibility, the pupils would neces- 
sarily enter the upper high school at a much higher level with re- 
spect to school standards than obtains under the present procedure. 

There remain two items of paramount significance not yet con- 
sidered : First, the effect of such an arrangement in reducing school 
mortality; second, the opportunity which it provides for modifying 
our courses of study and making the work of each cycle distinctive 
in purpose and in accomplished result. 

Ayres's study ^ of school mortality shows that the first break in 
school attendance comes at the close of the fifth grade or thereabouts ; 
that between this point and the first year of the high school 60 out of 
every 100 pupils leave school; that of the remaining 40 who enter 
high school 19 reach the second year, a loss of over 50 per cent be- 
tween the first and second high-school years; and that 10 only re- 
main to complete the secondary course. In California, 2^, on the 
average, enter normal schools, universities, and schools of a grade 

1 Ayres, Laggards in Our Schools. 



THE PLAN ADOPTED BY BERKELEY, CAL. 113 

beyond that of the high school, and 1^^ graduate. While given 
localities will vary from this general average, and while, indeed, 
Ayres's figures may not be exact,^ they unquestionably indicate a 
general tendency among the city school systems of this country. 

The break which begins in the firf th or sixth grade and continues 
through the seventh and eighth grades of the grammar school is 
due in part to the fact that by the time the children who have made 
slow progress have reached these upper grades they have come to 
an age which marks the termination of the compulsory school period, 
14 years in most States; besides, they are now old enough to com- 
mand a recognized earning power in the business world. In con- 
sequence the temptation to quit school can scarcely be resisted, 
particularly if their school work has been discouraging in respect to 
promotions. Furthermore, the work of the seventh and eighth grades 
is in most places diti'erentiated in no wise from that with which they 
have become familiar in the lower grades. The prospect of spend- 
ing two or three years beyond the fifth grade in the mere amplifica- 
tion and review of the elements already covered can hardly be 
expected to furnish any great incentive to those who have developed 
no overpowering ambition for an education. By terminating a 
cycle of work with the sixth year, unquestionably the tendency will 
be to hold such pupils in school at least one year longer — ^namely, to 
the end of the sixth grade. It is entirely reasonable to believe that 
by making the work of the next cycle different from that of the 
first, thus introducing elements of fresh interest, children who have 
not yet reached the age of 14 and who thus have not passed out from 
under the operation of the compulsory school law will become suffi- 
ciently interested in the work of the cycle to remain in at least 
until its completion. Therefore, through this arrangement those 
who have been retarded in the lower grades will tend to remain at 
least one year longer, until the first cycle of work is completed, and 
those who have made normal progress through the grades but who 
otherwise would drop out at the end of the eighth grade, when the 
compulsory school period for them ends, will tend also to remain a 
year longer, until the ninth grade is finished and the second cycle 
terminated. 

The explanation for the break in attendance between the ninth 
and tenth years, which experience shows to be a heavy one under the 
usual grouping of grades, lies largely in the fact that the pupil com- 
ing into the high school from the grades fails to make a proper 
adjustment. In consequence he begins to fail in his work, he becomes 
disheartened and discouraged, and quits before he reaches the tenth 
grade ; and, worst of all, he quits because he has failed. Throwing the 

1 See studies by Thorndike, Strayer, Keyes, Jones, and others. 



114 KEORGANIZATIOISI OF THE PUBLIC SCHOUL SVSTEM, 

seventh, eighth, and ninth grades together in a second cycle of work 
which shall have distinguishing characteristics from that which pre- 
cedes it as well as from that which follows, arranging everything 
connected therewith to make his work a three-year transition period 
from the elementary school to the upper high school, and yet shaping 
the work so that it is a unit in itself, which can be terminated, if 
necessary, at the end of the ninth year — these expedients will not 
only tend to hold a year longer the pupil who would otherwise drop 
out at the end of the eighth year, but w^ill go very far toward insur- 
ing a complete adjustment to the conditions which prevail in the 
upper high school. They likewise offer at the end of the ninth year 
an opportunity for the pupil to check up his own judgment and to 
determine whether his circumstances, as well as his tastes, are such 
as to justify him in going on for three years more of secondary work. 
If, after making a careful survey of such matters, he decides to leave 
school, he leaves conscious of having succeeded rather than of having 
failed, and a very different reaction upon his character follows. 

It is scarcely fair to the plan which has been inaugurated recently 
in Berkeley to judge of its results during the period of its establish- 
ment, but the indications, in respect to the effect of the arrangement 
upon this problem of school mortality, are already striking. Out 
of a total of 453 pupils who were enrolled in the ninth grade in 
1910-11, and who should normally be found the next year in the 
tenth grade, 118 are missing. Of the 118 pupils who did not appear 
in 1911-12 in the tenth grade, 20 are repeating their work in whole 
or in part, and hence are still in the system ; 22 have moved to other 
cities, and are known to have entered the schools therein; 17 are 
working ; 3 are out on account of illness ; 17 went to business schools, 
convents, and private schools ; and 39 have disappeared without leav- 
ing any clue as to their reasons or intentions. Two of these groups, 
that repeating work and that which has entered other public schools, 
itggi'egating 42 pupils, can not be considered as a proper charge 
against the local system. For the remaining 76, representing an 
actual loss of 16.7 per cent of the total number enrolled, the system 
must assume responsibility. Unfortunately, data are not available to 
show what the school mortality was in the ninth grade in Berkeley 
in previous years. While, doubtless, it was less than Ayres's aver- 
ages show, it certainly did not differ in any such degree as that 
which obtains under the reorganized plan now in force. The re- 
sponse, therefore, in lessening the mortality between the ninth and 
tenth grades through arranging our school work in three cycles has 
been so immediate and decisive as to admit of no doubt respecting 
the tendency. 

Perhaps, however, the consideration of greatest significance which 
such a plan of school organization offers lies in the opportunity 



TM.E PLAJSI ADOJflED Bl' BERKELEY, CAL. 115 

that it gives of radically changing the nature and the content of 
the courses of study. 

In the commendable effort to fashion a school organization so 
that the path from the kindergarten to the university may be made 
easy and straight, the assumption has prevailed that every child 
passing along this way most needs that content and training which 
will best prepare for each succeeding grade and ultimately, in turn, 
for the university. In their absorption in the task of keeping such 
a pathway accessible to all alike, educators have failed to hit upon 
the fact that specific preparation for successive grades and divisions 
is not essential to an open track. The traditional attitude is that 
of one seeking to learn what the high school and the university 
demand of their intrants; whereas, were the university and the 
high school to say, as they in reason should, " We shall take pupils 
of requisite school experience where we find them in point of learn- 
ing," the educational way would remain unobstructed, and yet all 
would be getting that content and training that would best prepare 
for living. In the face of the facts that the masses go no further 
than the first five or six grades, that 80 out of every 100 leave during 
the next three or four grades, and that less than 3 per cent ever 
reach the university, a course of instruction which seeks, primarily, 
to prepare for successive institutions on up the grade line is absurd. 
Instead, the matter should be put in some such way as this : Assum- 
ing that every boy and girl leaves school at the end of the sixth 
year, what shall the schools give ? Again, assuming that everybody 
leaves school at the end of the ninth year, what shall the schools 
give? And similarly for the third cycle of work terminating with 
the twelfth or fourteenth year of school life: Assuming that all 
are to leave school and that no one is to enter the university, what 
should they receive at the hands of the school on this third level? 
The answer to these questions will comprise that content and train- 
ing which will be best for those who are leaving our schools, and 
likewise best for those who pass on from grade to grade, finally 
reaching the highest institutions in our system. Furthermore, a 
content selected on such a basis will tend more strongly to hold our 
pupils in school than one based upon the idea that the chief pur- 
pose of our schools is a preparatory one. The effect of this shift 
in the conception of the function of our school system will be mo- 
mentous. The plan of organization which Berkeley has adopted 
lends itself to the effective application of this conception. 



Chapter VII. 

THE COURSE OF STUDY— THE FIRST CYCLE. 



Contents. — Contributions to a science of education from the fields of child psychology, 
social psychology, experimental pedagogy, and experimental didactics — Criteria for 
determining the content of a course of study ; characteristic stages in child growth ; 
the mind of the social group — Application of the criteria to the work of the first 
cycle ; the " tools " of an education ; the mother tongue ; the birth and growth of our 
country ; an interpretation of the environment of natuie ; a survey of the world and 
its peoples ; home economics and manual training ; the knowledge to conserve health 
and protect life ; a provision against the ennui of leisure hours ; the chief demand of 
this cycle is expressed in the term " literacy." 



When the science of education shall have become fully formulated 
we shall have ready at hand complete and verifiable conclusions re- 
lating to three important aspects of the educative process: The child, 
the significant psychophysical characteristics which mark stages in 
its growth; the demands of the social group into which the child is 
born and in which he must live; and the teaching method, whereby 
economy of time and of effort in teaching and learning is secured. 
In the selection of the content of a course of study, in retaining essen- 
tials and eliminating nonessentials, and in the arrangement of these 
details in orderly wholes wherein there shall be found a proper 
gradation in difficulty, we require accurate knowledge of the first 
two aspects — ^the physical and psychic characteristics of the child as 
they develop in the several stages of his growth, and the require- 
ments of the social group in which the child must live. In the 
presentation of the body of knowledge thus selected and arranged 
regard must be paid to the third — that which has to do with economy 
of time and of effort in the teaching method. Beginnings only have 
thus far been made in gathering together a body of scientific knowl- 
edge in each of these fields. Child psychology is working in the first 
of these; social psychology is attacking the problems arising in the 
second of these fields ; while for the third, investigations being made 
by experimental pedagogy and experimental didactics should yield 
contributions. 

The advance which has been made in the first of these fields is to 
be credited to G. Stanley Hall and his school of child-study investi- 
gators. The field of social psychology is being marked out and the 
problems defined by Eoss, Howard, McDougall (Oxford), Giddings, 
116 



THE COUBSE OF STUDY THE FIEST CYCLE. 117 

Ward, MacDougall (New York), and others. Nothing, however, has 
been done as yet by these men in applying their conclusions to for- 
mal education, and least of all to the course of study. In the field of 
experimental pedagogy and experimental didactics America has 
lagged behind Germany, though through the efforts of Radosavlje- 
vich and Sanford interest is being aroused. In Germany there are 
many workers in this province, among whom are Meuman, Stern, 
Lipmann, Schultze, Lay, Kerchensteiner, Messmer, and Albien, not 
to mention others in some respects fully as prominent. 

Progi'ess so far made in these departments of education, while far 
short of where the results can properly be described by the term 
'" science," nevertheless these results make certain that the future will 
see the accumulation of such a body of verifiable conclusions as will 
justify that term. In the meantime schools must be kept open, 
courses of study must be provided, children must be taught. We are 
still forced, in the absence of scientifically demonstrable conclusions, 
to fall back upon the less satisfying product of observation and per- 
sonal opinion. However, in the light of the progress already made 
in these fields of education, our personal opinions can at least ground 
themselves on a basis of probability. 

The Hall school of child study has made clear the existence of at 
least two significant periods in the development of our children — the 
adolescent and the preadolescent periods. Each of these is shown to 
have differentiating and distinguishing characteristics, both physical 
and mental. In the preceding chapter it was shown that the six- 
three-three arrangement of grades is one which recognizes these 
stages in child development and that it is an arrangement of school 
machinery making it easy for school officials to plan and carry their 
work into effect in conformity to the differing characteristics of these 
periods. In the selection of the content of a course of study and in 
the arrangement of the details in an orderly and progressive whole, 
due regard must be paid to the matter of stages in child growth. 

The other criterion in this process is found in the field of social 
psychology. Recent discussions here have suggested an illuminating 
conception — ^namely, that the social group possesses a social mind and 
a social consciousness that are concrete entities, quite as concrete as 
are the mind and the consciousness of the individual. This idea, now 
generally accepted by sociologists and social psychologists, requires 
a word of description. 

The mind of the individual, it is held, is a residual store of experi- 
ences, thoughts, emotions, which are condensed in intuitions and 
formulated into principles that in turn direct and modify all future 
experiences. The group also is a residual storehouse of experiences, 



118 KEOKGAi\'lZAT10K OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

feelings, emotions, common to its members, and which direct and 
modify all future experiences of the group. Bit by bit, as time passes, 
these accumulate into bodies of common feelings, general desires, a 
recognized moral code, a public opinion, a general will of the com- 
munity — all of which it is convenient to designate by the term " social 
mind." ^ 

The social mind is the dominating force. It is the judge that passes 
in review the myriad of suggestions springing from the minds of the 
individuals. Most are condemned; a few ideas, suggestions, plans, 
schemes, are caught up by it and used. To the extent these merge in 
the social mind, to that extent they modify it. The social mind is 
constantly changing, continually growing, though slowly. It is, 
however, always dominant and never subordinate. Politics, govern- 
ment, art, invention must recognize in the social mind their master. 
It is so too with education. A glance at the history of this field of 
human endeavor will show that the educative process has always been 
determined by the social mind. The social mind accepted the idea of 
the State long before it did the idea of a State-supported school 
system with attendance made compulsory upon all. This followed 
only when the social mind accepted the idea that the integrity of the 
State and its permanence depended upon an educated citizenship. 
That education compelled this recognition of the social mind does 
not change the fact that the latter is dominant; at most it only 
serves to show that there is a reciprocal influence. In the light of 
history, the work of educators who have reforms to urge, and the 
work of those who occupy the more humble station of disciples seek- 
ing to adapt and apply the master's ideas, must in the end be evaluated 
by the social mind — the mind of the group. In so far as these work- 
ers have interpreted the group-mind correctly, to that degree will 
their work live; to the degree that they have failed in catching its 
purpose and spirit, to that degree will their efforts prove fruitless. 
In the group, then — in its feeling, its thought, its will, its mind — we 
find the second of our criteria for the selection of the content of the 
courses to be offered in each of the three cycles which is provided by 
the plan of organization we are discussing. 

Before seeking to apply these criteria in detail, however, it should 
be noted that each group, each community, each nation, has its own 
social mind, as unlike the social mind of any other society as are its 
physical characteristics,^ and that, moreover, people come together 
in association for a myriad reasons, forming innumerable groups — 
some permanent in their existence, many fleeting and evanescent. 
At once, then, the question arises, which group is to be appealed to 

1 Lewes, Problems of Life and Mind: The Study of Psychology, p. 161. 

2 Giddlngs, Sociology. 



THE COURSE OF STUDY THE EIEST CYCLE. 119 

in seeking suggestions for courses of study ? Obviously not religious 
groups exclusively, nor groups based upon political platforms, philo- 
sophical creeds, or scientific beliefs. Nor should appeal be made to 
those groups Avhich, because of a strong emotional demand, are 
suddenly formed and, after expressing their will, as suddenly dis- 
solve. The American public school. State supported and State con- 
trolled as it is, if it be true to the democratic principles upon which 
both it and the State are founded, can accept direction from no 
group less in its extent than that which admits to membership every 
normal adult American citizen. The only group satisfying such con- 
ditions is clearly the State group. 

That the State group has a mind and a will, in the sense in which 
these terms are used by the psychologist, can not be questioned. 
Neither can it be questioned that in the State group are to be found 
great " planes of uniformity "of thought respecting the function of 
the public school and the results which it should secure; though 
neither can it be denied that these planes of uniformity are broken 
up into " currents," which " bear portions of the group along for a 
time and then cease." ^ It is to these planes of uniformity in the 
State group that the practical educator must appeal if he would 
frame a course of study which will function to the maximum in the 
education of our youth. 

Here lies a serious difficulty. While the social mind is more than 
the individual mind, yet it exists only in the minds of the individuals 
forming the group. An analysis of the mental states of the social 
mind is a more difficult problem than that of the individual, for the 
reason that the social mind has no official and authoritative spokes- 
man, whereas, in the case of the individual, he himself acts as the 
mouthpiece for the operations of his own mind. In studying the 
social mind, however, the individual must turn from his own mind 
to the study of minds in association — a much more elusive and per- 
plexing task. Until science has evolved methods of study in this 
virgin field we are of necessity forced back upon the crude methods 
with which every science begins — the methods of observation and of 
trial and error. In the bold attempt to interpret the demand of the 
social mind respecting the content of a course of study for its schools, 
and to organize it in line with the interests dominant in the child 
in successive stages of its growth, we must recognize these limitations. 
However, after an interpretation has been made, it will be a simple 
matter to determine the degree of its validity. If the result is 
indorsed by the social mind, it will live ; if not, it will fail, because it 
is not an interpretation of the mind of the State group. 

2 Ross, Social Psyohologi/. 



120 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

THE FIRST CYCLE. 

The first question, then, for which an answer will be sought may be 
stated in the following way : On the assumption that every boy and 
girl will leave school at the end of the first six years, what do the 
State group and the preadolescent stage of growth demand that they 
receive from the school? 

Differ as men may respecting details, all will agree that the first 
six years of school life should give the " tools " of an education ; cor- 
rect habits in the use of the mother tongue; familiarity with the 
simple thrilling story of the birth and growth of our country, with 
emphasis on what the citizen owes the community for what it gives 
him; an interpretation of the common things of nature in the 
environment; an elementary survey of the world and its peoples, 
from the traveler's viewpoint; the useful things in home economics 
and in manual training, the one for the girls and the other for the 
boys; sufficient knowledge to conserve health and protect life; and 
finally, provision against the ennui of leisure hours, by laying the 
foundations of taste in music, in art, and in literature. 

Learning to read, to write, to spell, and to use the processes of arith- 
metic that fall within the simple situations of the child's experience, 
must remain now, as of old, the distinctive work of this period ; for 
not only must the masses be given the means necessary to the free 
expression of their thoughts and emotions, but also, if they are to 
get on at all, they must be able to supplement and extend the educa- 
tion that they receive in school through the medium of the news- 
paper, the magazine, and the serious book. Fortunately, the school 
is not the only means which society has evolved for the education of 
youth, and many men have risen to places of great usefulness with- 
out the formal instruction of the school. The library, with its wealth 
of material; the lecture platform; the pulpit; and the forum of 
political discussion — all provide compensating opportunities for an 
education lacking in the formal elements. Once in the possession of 
the so-called tools and the will to use them, an education useful, 
thorough, and satisfying can be secured in ways which lie outside the 
school. An important objective, therefore, for the school during this 
period of work must be that of thoroughly grounding its members 
m tlue use of these essential subjects — a task which can nowhere be 
accomplished so well as in the school. By doing this the school 
places within the possession of each child the means of overcoming 
the lack due to an abbreviated school course. 

In reading, not only should there be secured the ability to under- 
stand the content of the written and printed page, but there is abun- 
dant reason for securing some skill in the practice of reading aloud. 
Ability in this particular can be made an instrument which in itself 



THE COUESE OF STUDY THE FIEST CYCLE. 121 

is of power in conserving the integrity and harmony of the home, 
through its proper use in contributing to a feeling of companionship. 

The ability to write a rapid legible hand has much value in the 
business world, and the pupils, who leave our schools at the end of 
the sixth grade will often find that the possession of skill in this 
respect is a passport to reasonably good positions if qualities of 
character and alertness are also present. On the other hand, a boy 
who is careless and slovenly in writing, as well as in personal appear- 
ance and manner of speech, carries with him very obvious evidences 
of unfitness. 

Along with securing skill in reading and writing must go train- 
ing in the spelling of those words of our language which are within 
the vocabulary commonly used ; for, again, the business man has little 
patience with the employee whose training in this respect is careless 
and imperfect. From the first days of school life, therefore, and 
continuing throughout the entire school course, the school must 
insist that serious attention be given to the task of learning to 
spell. It is desirable in this period to center the effort of the school 
upon a well-selected vocabulary, from which are eliminated those 
words which are likely to be used by the pupil infrequently, and 
thus gain time for a complete mastery of the form of the com- 
paratively few words that are used almost constantly. It would 
seem that the matter of determining a minimum vocabulary of 
common words should not be difficult. An examination of the cor- 
respondence of business firms, of the vocabulary used by the news- 
papers and popular magazines, together with a list of the non- 
technical words employed by lecturers on popular topics, would give 
a list of words which, if thoroughly mastered, would fortify the 
pupil against criticism in respect to his spelling.^ 

In no particular is the work of the school more severely criticized 
by the men of affairs employing young people of varying ages who 
have dropped out of the schools than in respect to the simple proc- 
esses of arithmetic. Ask any dozen men in the business world what 
they expect of the schools in this early period and they will reply : 
" Accuracy in the simple processes of arithmetic we most need." Yet 
in this very particular the schools most frequently fail; and the 
failure is largely due to the fact that, in the reaction from the highly 
formalized work of a generation or so ago, the pedagogical world 
is laboring under the idea that the repetition and drill necessary to 
the getting of a tangible precipitate are methods which, if pursued, 
suggest that the teacher possesses some of the attributes of a fossil. 
Freedom and effectiveness in the social group, for which this period 

1 For such a study of the vocabulary used in business and personal correspondence, see 
Ayres, The Spelling Vocabularies of Personal and Business Letters. See also Cook, W. A., 
and O'Shea, M. V., The Child and His Spelling; Ayres, L. P., The Spelling Scale. 



122 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

of school work must prepare, do not demand a mastery of a body J 
of mathematical principles, logically arranged and nicely articulated. 1 
such as is attempted when emphasis is laid on the subject as a whole; 
but they do demand the knowing very thoroughly a few special 
things, and in their special applications. Of this first period society 
rightly demands that the schools give ability to count and to read 
and write numbers; accuracy and rapidity in the four fundamental 
processes operating in the field of whole numbers and fractions; 
simple exercises in the application of these processes to the real prob- 
lems arising in those activities involving the number relation; a 
knowledge of the tables of measurement which are in common use: 
ability to reduce such tables within three places; and, lastly, some 
general information concerning business practices in accounting. 
Whatever is given in the first six years beyond this enumeration of 
essentials consumes time which would better be used in other ways. 
While the above enumeration of essentials contemplates that gener- 
ous omission be made from our texts, it also proposes that better re- 
sults be obtained within the suggested limits than are usually secured j 
in our schools; and this applies particularly to the getting of ac- 
curacy and facility in the processes. 

That entirely satisfactory results, comprehended within the fore- 
going tool-subjects, can be secured in the first six years of school life 
has been completely demonstrated in various places and among 
various schools. The opinion that the mastery, within reasonable 1 
limits, of these largely mechanical matters demands a long period of 
years is entirely erroneous. Not alone from the standpoint of those 
who drop out of school at the end of the first six years should these 
results be secured, but they are needed as well by those who are 
going on into the work of succeeding cycles. 

Along with the work of placing the " tools '" of an education in the 
possession of the children of this early period should go the giving of 
correct habits in the use of the mother tongue and for reasons which 
are much the same. No one thing, perhaps, adds more to the personal 
influence of an individual " than ability to express himself, in oral 
and written form, in terse, idiomatic English. The man out in life 
who has acquired this ability is bound to be a leader among his fel- 
lows. Too much attention, therefore, can not be given in this first 
period of school work to the acquisition of such power in the field of 
the vernacular. 

In securing this power, however, the teacher of English is handi- 
capped from the outset by two serious obstacles which define her 
limitations as well as her opportunity. In the first place the social 
environment of the child is against the teacher. The language of 
the playground, of the street, and often of the home is careless and 
slovenly : and in no respect do these elements of the child's environ- 



THE COUESE OF STUDY THE FIEST CYCLE. 123 

meut contribute to help the teacher, but seriously increase the diffi- 
culty of her problem. Correct forms may be recognized and even 
used in the classroom, but outside the classroom and away from the 
personal influence of the teacher the tendency to lapse into the lan- 
guage of the environment is very strong. With arithmetic, history, 
geography, and, indeed, with almost all of the subjects employed in 
the schoolroom, the teacher begins with virgin soil. In the field of 
the vernacular, however, this soil has already been choked with the 
weeds of ungrammatical forms. It is against this formidable ob- 
struction that the school must continually struggle.^ 

In the second place, the teacher of English, in particular, suffers 
because of the tendency to shift all responsibility for the formal edu- 
cation of the child from the home to the school. Never before in the 
history of the school as an institution has society placed upon it the 
responsibilities that now obtain. While the theory has long been held 
that society must stand for the development of its members into re- 
sponsible, law-abiding citizens, able to care for themselves and for 
those dependent upon them, the practice of races and nations in this 
respect has lagged very far behind the theory. Much of the responsi- 
bility borne hitherto by the church and the home has been shifted to 
the shoulders of the school, and with this shift in responsibility has 
come into the home, naturally, a feeling that it need not stand sponsor 
in any serious measure for the things which the school is trying to do. 
In short, the strong movement toward paternalism which is now on 
in our country tends to bring about a pauperization of the home in 
respect to the care and training of its youth ; and, in consequence, the 
school finds it increasingly difficult to arouse in the home more than a 
passing interest in the training of the child. The teacher of English 
is the first to feel vitally this lack of cooperation. 

These difficulties that from the outset confront the teacher who is 
striving to establish correct habits in the use of the mother tongue 
suggest her opportunity, which lies through tactful effort to secure 
the cooperation of the home in this important work. In no depart- 
ment of activity undertaken by the school can very much be done, 
unless the intelligent and sympathetic cooperation of the home be 
secured. The movement toward caring for the health of the children 
and removing physical handicaps; the attempt to take the children 
off the streets during the leisure hours and congregate them at play- 
grounds under wise supervision; the interest now taken in deter- 
mining the aptitudes of our young people from the standpoint of 
future occupation and the effort to guide them in the wise selection 
of a vocation ; and the arrangements being introduced in many of our 
schools for training in thrift — all these, in very large measure, rest 
back for their success upon the interested cooperation of the home. 

1 See Chubb, The Teaching of English, Ch. II. 
5930°— 16 9 



124 REOEGAlSriZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

It must be so, too, in those more formal particulars that have long 
been the peculiar function of the school. With the tendency to shift 
responsibility from the home to the school, there must be a refusal of 
the latter to permit these two institutions to become alienated. 
Through the mediumship of mothers' clubs, through public meetings 
addressed by school officers and school officials, and through private 
conversation in the homes of the children, an interest in the correct 
and effective use of the vernacular can be secured. 

A considerable factor in good citizenship is respect and reverence 
for the traditions associated with the growth of the Nation. The 
qualities of moral and physical courage, high-minded patriotism, and 
fertility of resource in the presence of new and difficult situations 
are finely expressed in the lives of American pioneers. To acquaint 
the children with men of such force and excellence of character, and 
show by concrete detail how invincible were the souls of these men in 
following their chosen course to its last chapter, is to implant concep- 
tions and establish ideals whose citizenship value can not be over- 
estimated.' 

Biography, then, in the early grades, affords the fitting approach 
to a more systematic and connected narrative of the rise of our 
Nation, properly given in the last months of this cycle of work. In 
the presentation of this biographical material the teacher must re- 
member that it is the picture of the men and of the times in which 
they lived that is desired rather than an epitome of facts, and that 
this picture can not be adequately gotten if the reading and discus- 
sion be limited to meager and barren references. Satisfactory re- 
sults can be obtained only through the richness of the material pre- 
sented; and for this reason the teacher should seek to bring before 
the children for discussion as many pertinent details as possible. 
Furthermore, the teacher will find that time also is a factor that 
must not be neglected in securing an adequate impression of the life 
considered. It is fatal to clear-cut impressions to pass the details 
of a given biography in too rapid review. The result is mental con- 
fusion and a jumble of misinformation. Fewer stories, then, and a 
greater wealth of organized and interesting detail — concrete imagery, 
simple illustration, and human feeling — will lead to the most fruit- 
ful results in work of this character. It is desirable, particularly in 
the early years of this period, that teachers present biographical 
material orally, for no author, howeA^er prolific in language, can evei- 
produce the effect which is gotten through the interest, resource, and 
skill of a good teacher. Again, the average reading power of chil- 
dren in the primary grades is limited, and there are not many books 
of American biography which can easily be read by them. 

1 See McMurry, Special Method of History. 



THE COURSE OF STUDY — THE FIRST CYCLE. 125 

In the presentation of history stories the necessity for a clear 
geographical background can not be too greatly emphasized. Wall 
maps, globes, blackboard sketches, diagrams, and outline maps should 
be used in every story to make clear the simple geographical setting 
in which the action occurs. Without recourse to material of this 
kind the presentation of any phase of history can never be anything 
but confusing to the child. It is safe to say that no lesson in history 
should ever be given without making some reference to maps or dia- 
grams. 

The school has yet another task^to bring the potential citizen to 
a proper realization, in an elementary degree, of his place as an 
individual in the community, for if this be not accomplished there 
will be no focus to the work already sketched. Through discussion 
the pupil should be led to recognize that he is a member of a com- 
munity, and not merely an individual whose time is to be occupied 
solely in getting a living. As a member of a community he is asso- 
ciated with a great many different people having differing interests, 
differing needs, and varying ambitions, but grouped together for a 
common purpose. The class community of which the child is a mem- 
ber is typical, and is therefore an excellent point of departure. Here 
the child finds all the elements of the larger community for which the 
school should prepare, and is brought to realize that the conditions 
under which all may profit depend upon self-restraint. These con- 
siderations, growing out of the child's own experience and observa- 
tion, can be extended and applied to the larger communities, to the 
neighborhood, the city, the county, the State, and the Nation; for, 
at the bottom, the relationship which should obtain between the good 
citizen and these larger communities, of which he is to become a 
member, is not different from the relationship which should obtain 
between himself and his class community. Following such con- 
siderations, a discussion of how the larger community aids the citizen 
in satisfying his desire for health; in protecting his life and prop- 
erty; in satisfying his desire for knowledge and for beautiful sur- 
roundings; what the community does for those who do not, or who 
can not, contribute to its progress; and then, in turn, what the 
citizen owes the community for what the community is giving him, 
together with an elementary examination of a few of the most 
important parts of the machinery of government, will go far toward 
giving the future citizen those emotional and intellectual qualities 
which, combined in proper proportion, comprise the chief elements 
of good citizenship. 

The field of science is boundless. Even within the pupil's environ- 
ment the material at hand is overwhelming in variety and richness. 
In this first period of work the school should open the child's eyes to 
this beautiful and wonderful world and give him at least a desire to 



126 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

learn more about it. Through the efforts of the school he should I 
learn to identify the common flowers, cultivated and wild, and the 
common fruits and vegetables; he should learn why plants use 
rain and sunshine, earth and air, to live and work; how the fruit, 
roots, and sometimes other parts of the plant are used for store- 
houses of food, and how the ripened seed uses the animals and the 
Avinds for dispersal; and he should learn to recognize the common 
insects and study their habits. The mosquito, the house fly, the 
scale insect — how they grow and how destructive they are — should 
be dwelt upon, as well as the habits of the more beneficial bees and 
butterflies. The children should be able to recognize the common 
wild birds by sight and tone, the nests they build, the songs they 
sing, the ways that they employ for protection, and their use to 
man. The common domestic and wild animals of the locality should 
likewise be studied, beginning w^ith the child's pets, then extending 
consideration to the animals which are of service to man, and then 
to the best known and most interesting wild animals. The under- 
lying idea in this study of animals should be that of arousing a 
sympathy which will make it impossible for the child to be cruel 
or brutal in his treatment of them. The child ought also to be 
taught to refrain from the useless destruction of flowers and trees. 
Inanimate nature, too, should not be neglected in this interesting 
work. The wonders of the sun, the moon, the stars, the clouds, the 
winds, the rocks, the soils, and the part each plays in the economy 
of nature should not be overlooked. I 

The beginnings of this elementary work in the field of science 
can be made to center about the school garden, which offers a direct 
appeal to the natural interests of the children. The simple facts 
concerning the growth of plants, the life of insects and birds, and 
their dependence upon the plant world; questions of soil and what 
the plants must find in the soil upon which to grow ; the weather and 
its bearing upon both soils and plant life; as well as a simple view 
of many of the industries by which people earn their livelihood — 
can be made to spring directly out of the little plats of ground which 
each child loves to claim as his oAvn. Not only does the school gar- 
den offer the opportunity for a natural starting point for considera- 
tions of this character, but it gives an opportunity for teaching, in 
a concrete and effective way, some of the necessary civic virtues, such 
as respect for the property of others, the dignity of labor, the recog- 
nition that individual wishes must be subordinated to the common 
good, honesty in dealing with one's fellows, thrift and economy, as 
well as attention to little details. All of these qualities in an ele- 
mentary degree can be emphasized in the activities associated with 
the school garden if the teacher be alive to her opportunity. Fur- 
thermore, through the agency of the school garden, the interest 



THE COURSE OF STUDY THE FIRST CYCLE. 127 

aroused in growing things can easily be extended to the home and 
the city, resulting in a permanent desire to beautify these. 

The work of the later years of this cycle should be accomplished 
through the medium of the school excursion which, under the leader- 
ship of some older person who is familiar with forest and field, can 
be made a most valuable adjunct to the more formal work of the 
classroom. Here, of course, success depends very largely upon the 
loiowledge possessed by the leader and the skill with which she con- 
ducts her party. The blind can scarcely lead the blind, but the 
teacher who sees the significance of the things in the natural environ- 
ment about her will find in the school excursion a wonderful oppor- 
tunity for influencing the young lives in her keeping. 

In the departments of home economics and of manual training 
there is a useful content which should be drawn upon during this first 
cycle of work, for about the only sj^stematic training in preparation 
for the duties of the household which can be relied upon is that which 
the school gives. Many of the girls who drop out of school during 
this period and go to work in shops and factories marry at an early 
age, and unless the school supplies the training these enter upon their 
duties without adequate preparation for home-keeping. The ability 
to do plain sewing neatly and expeditiously, together with practice 
in the cooking of simple, wholesome foods, can be secured within the 
limits of this first cycle of work. 

By the end of this period the girls should be familiar with the com- 
mon stitches and seams, and know when to use them. They should 
understand the methods of putting on bands and how to make plack- 
ets and buttonholes. They should learn how to care for and repair 
clothing and develop neatness in patching and darning. They should 
learn further, through concrete work in sewing, how to hold the 
material and how to use the sewing tools in order to save time and 
labor. All of the foregoing should be accomplished through the 
making of useful articles which are of interest to the pupils, rather 
than through making models which in themselves are without value. 
The articles may well be small, in order that too many lessons may 
not be required for completion, as the interest of young children 
quickly flags. It is well, too, to begin in the early years with coarse 
materials, coarse thread, and large needles, and only gradually de- 
mand greater fineness of work. In the selection of materials for the 
articles to be made, an opportunity is presented for valuable discus- 
sions relating to the adaptability and suitability of various textiles, 
together with a consideration of the important item of cost. The 
commercial pattern and its use in making simple garments should 
also be explained and applied. Also some familiarity with the sew- 
ing machine should be gained. 



128 REORGANIZATION OP THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

The school course in cookery should establish orderly and neat 
habits in the housework processes, and arouse an interest in the care 
of the home. Aside from instruction in the preparation of the com- 
mon dishes, the problem of using the left-over foods should also be 
considered. A study should be made of table setting and the serving 
of simple home meals, together with the cost of food materials. The 
proper care of the kitchen, of the stove, of supplies, of the garbage, 
of the various utensils should not be overlooked, for the beginning of 
disease can frequently be traced to insanitary kitchens. In this cycle 
emphasis must be laid on securing correct habits, for the pupils are 
as yet too young to grasp the reasons for many of the things which 
they will need to do on the assumption that they are to become home 
makers w^ithout further school work. 

From the work in the manual-training shop, which the boy of this 
cycle can get, should come familiarity with the common tools and 
some readiness in their use, through making the toys and the simple I 
useful articles in which he is interested. He can be taught how to 
make shelves and boxes; how to repair gates and fences; what to do 
when the sink gets choked up, when the door bell refuses to work, 
and when the stove persists in smoking. Beyond securing the dex- 
terity in handling tools which his development will permit, he needs, 
quite as much as the girls, to know how to do some simple sewing, 
and also how to cook simple dishes. Life in the camp, now so general, j 
makes it desirable that a course for boys be shaped up, giving the 1 
useful things in sewing and cooking. The activities of the shop, 
furthermore, should properly include the consideration of various 
industries, thus adding to the fund of general information which the 
pupil needs to possess if he is to become socially efficient to any con- 
siderable degree. As with sewing and cooking, no great skill can be 
developed in the use of shop tools in this early period, but a begin- 
ning, at least, can and should be made. I 

Again, before the children leave school, an elementary survey 1 
of the world and its people should have been given. This can best * 
be done through the medium of geography. More and more, geog- 
raphy is coming to be recognized as the study of man, his home, and 
his activities, and of the forces and processes which affect him in 
some significant way. With each advance in knowledge concern- 
ing the conditions which have brought men to their present high 
place, a clearer conception is gained of the beauty and order of the 
system by which the processes of nature have helped make men what 
they are. The guiding principle in the selection of details for this 
period of work must still be the same, namely, the demands of the 
social group for which pupils are being prepared. 

The group is vitally interested in the daily record of what the 
world as a whole is doing in the fields of diplomacy, of trade, of 



THE COURSE OF STUDY — THE FIEST CYCLE. 129 

science, of art — the world's serious work. It is greatly interested, 
too, in the relative progress which each country is making in these 
departments of activity, and in the struggle of each to solve the old 
problem of national achievement and individual development. But 
as all this is conditioned by altitude, climate, rainfall, occupations, 
rivers and mountain ranges, proximity to the seacoast, and by acces- 
sibility, it is through watching the play of these forces of environ- 
ment in the progress of specific countries and localities, and through 
attempting to evaluate each, that there comes that clear vision and 
that sane judgment which our group must needs have, if it meets 
successfully the difficulties of the future. 

The first step in the understanding of these forces in human devel- 
opment and achievement lies in the domain of geography. A pre- 
sentation of such considerations suitable to the comprehension of the 
children in this early period will go very far toward lifting them 
out of the rut of provincialism and narrowness in thinking which 
are too generally the characteristics of unschooled people. The 
essentials of the subject, from this standpoint, can best be considered 
in two main divisions, namely, representative geography and those 
considerations which fall within the descriptive and physical aspects 
of the subject. 

The study of geography, from the standpoint of the needs of the 
masses, should leave a precipitate of map conceptions and map loca- 
tions. Though the idea that such work is all of geography, or 
Indeed any considerable part of it, is not for a moment to be enter- 
tained. It is useful, for example, to have a definite mental image of 
the great land and water masses of the world in their relative 
space relations one to the other and expressed in terms of the globe 
and of the flat map ; for such a mental image clarifies and gives point 
to the record of the world's happenings which each day finds its 
way to the homes. It is necessary to know the location of places like 
London, Paris, New York, Boston, New Orleans, Chicago, and San 
Francisco, because the social group talks, writes, and reads about 
these places, as well as for the reason that the influences which are 
directing the course of the world's progress emanate from them. It 
'is necessary to have the salient relief features of the continents, in 
what heat and light zones these continents lie, and the direction of 
their prevailing winds, that the climate of each characteristic area, 
the occupations of the inhabitants of each, and the kind of civiliza- 
tion each has developed may be known; all of which information 
is a part of the common possession of the larger social group. Chil- 
dren leaving the grades at the end of this first cycle of work should 
know a modicvim of map facts, and the teacher should see to it that 
they know it well. 



130 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

As to what, in detail, these essential facts are is somewhat a 
matter of personal opinion, as an interpretation of what prej^ara- 
tion will bring freedom and effectiveness in the social group must 
always be. It is possible to eliminate at once what has been called 
'' sailor geography," the term referring to that information which 
only a mariner finds of value. It is possible to eliminate also the 
work of learning geography by formula, bounding States and " de- 
scribing "' rivers, which occupied much of the time of the teacher of 
geography a generation ago. Furthermore, there can be a generous 
omission in learning the capitals and largest cities of the several 
States in the Union. These are bits of encyclopedic information 
which the members of the social group can scarcely be expected 
to have at hand. It is sufficient for much of the detail of every sub- 
ject to know where it is to be found when it is needed. Again, a 
phase of geography work which received some painstaking atten- 
tion at the hands of older teachers, and which with advantage can be 
greatly modified, is the matter of map drawing. On the construc- 
tive side, all will agree that, to make daily reading intelligible, a 
clear-cut mental image of the great land and water masses in their 
proper space relationship is needed, together with the political and 
relief features in each division. In the daily formal work of creat- 
ing such a mental image the most effective methods are the direct 
methods of repetition and drill, but with this caution: Such repeti- 
tion and drill must not be verbal, but, on the other hand, of such a 
nature that each successive trial makes more accurate the mental 
image which is the chief objective of work of this character. 

The content of geography has universally been organized about the 
several political areas of the world, irrespective of the fact that polit- 
ical boundaries are frequently accidental and frequently shifting, 
and irrespective of the fact also that a given political area may com- 
prise, within its boundaries, geographical features that are common 
to other areas. An examination of the continents will show that 
each breaks up naturally into certain geographical regions and that 
each of these regions has a set of characteristics which differentiate 
it from every other region. Except where the two coincide, the polit- 
ical area should give place to the " characteristic geographical area," 
which offers the only natural basis for the organization of the geo- 
graphical content. Furthermore, in selecting such a basis of organi- 
zation, the problem of essentials, from the standpoint which we are 
urging, namely, the needs of the masses, is greatly simplified, for it 
becomes necessary to determine only those features of each " area " 
that are characteristic of it, and that serve to give it its individuality. 
It is impossible in the time at the command of the grade teacher to 
present any great refinement of analysis ; neither is it desirable. The 
function of the work of this first period is not so much to make an 



THE COURSE OP STUDY — THE FIRST CYCLE. 131 

exhaustive study of any one subject or topic, as it is to lay a broad 
foundation of interest and appreciation, such as to induce the child 
to continue the work after he leaves school. If, then, his attention 
be centered upon the most obvious features of each of the character- 
istic areas, and if, in his mind, there be grouped in each of these re- 
gions such a body of concrete material and related detail, selected to 
give meaning to the " characteristics," then all will have been accom- 
plished that our point of view demands. In short, therefore, as with 
representative geography, it becomes easy and possible to select the 
characteristic features of each of the important geographical regions, 
and to present these and these only in our schools. 

In such presentation the teacher should rest back heavily upon 
the method of organized oral discussion, based, so far as possible, 
on the reading of interesting illustrated material by the child, A 
kaleidoscopic method of handling the work of the recitation not 
only renders the teacher's desire to check results ineffective, but it 
leads to mental distraction on the child's part, which ultimately 
works out into careless habits of reading and study. 

In the course of the presentation of the given lesson unit the 
teacher will find that there are certain facts which have value in 
themselves, apart from their use in the development of the point 
receiving treatment. These intrinsically valuable facts should be 
gathered up at the close of the lesson unit and drilled upon from 
time to time, in order to insure their permanent retention. Through 
these means the child who terminates this cycle of work should 
have the characteristic areas of the world in mind, and associated 
with each, and without confusion, he should have those representa- 
tive, descriptive, and physical essentials which give the several re- 
gions their individuality, and a Imowledge of which the social group 
demands for the abundant entrance of its members. 

The schools, too, must give knowledge sufficient to conserve health 
and protect life, for one's health and one's life and the conserving 
of the health and lives of others are fundamental to social efficiency. 
Such knowledge demands three things: A body of health informa- 
tion; the establishment of some common health habits; and the im- 
parting of specific instruction, made automatic, respecting what to 
do when confronted with any one of a few of the common emer- 
gencies which may at any time arise in the experience of each. 

Health information should be centered about the view that the 
human body is a living machine which accumulates energy from the 
food it consumes; gives off waste substances, for it can not change 
all of its food into energy any more than can a locomotive or a 
steam engine ; and repairs itself as it goes along, although it finally 
wears out. In the discussions and investigations of the pupils re- 
specting the important organs of the body the teacher should dwell 



132 REOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

particularly upon those things which interfere with the proper ac- 
tion of this li^'ing machine, and how it may be managed so as to 
give the best possible work with the least waste of energy.^ This 
thought should be given a place of first importance, that nature has 
provided the body with defenses against the things which would 
attack it, which, if properly conserved and cared for, will insure 
good health and long life. 

In turn, the courses of disease should be considered and the sug- 
gestion noted that serious inroads are made only when the natural 
resistance power of the body has been weakened through sudden chill- 
ing; through unhealthful occupations; through loss of sleep; through 
poor food, or too little, or too much food; through bad habits; 
through debilitating climates ; through breathing impure air ; not to 
mention other common means. Contagious diseases, too, should be 
considered, and what students have found out about their control and 
cure, and how the spread of the more common ones can be prevented, 
with emphasis upon the final conclusion that control of these diseases 
is largely a matter of complete cleanliness of person and of surround- 
ings, and that disease can not thrive where there are clean habits, 
sunshine, fresh air, and variety and simplicity in food. The children 
of this cycle are not too immature to understand much of what is 
being done for the health of communities. The care of the local 
water supply; methods for disposing of sewage and garbage; the 
fight against the common drinking cup, the house fly, and the mos- 
quito; the cleaning up of streets and back yards; the antispitting 
crusade; the screening of edibles on display at stores; and the fight 
for clean milk and pure food, are all topics which are of command- 
ing importance and in which the masses must be interested if health 
conditions in country and city are to be improved. 

Health habits are quite as important in the life of the individual 
as a body of health information. It should be the duty of the home 
and of the school to place in the possession of every child a daily 
routine of personal acts, designed to insure healthful living, and their 
practice should be compelled until they take their places among the 
things which we do without thinking. If such acts do not become 
automatic in the life of the child, education will have failed in an im- 
portant particular.2 The place for forming the common health 
habits is in the home, but if, as is too frequently the case, the home 
has neglected this important duty, the teacher must step in and seek 
to make up to the child what he has lost. 

Scarcely a day passes that one does not hear of some accident 
wherein a life could have been saved by the prompt action of some one 
who knew exactly what to do. In such an emergency, sympathy and 

1 See the point of view in Uoa^, Health {Studies. Heath & Co. 

2 For a suggested daily routine see Allen, Civics and Health, pp. 212, 213. 



!rHE COURSE OF STUDY — THE FIRST CYCLE. 133 

good intentions are no substitute for specific information. Definite 
knowledge respecting the emergencies which may happen any moment 
should be systematically imparted by the school, and the correct pro- 
cedure drilled upon until the proper routine in each instance becomes 
relatively automatic. Furthermore, self-possession and presence of 
mind in the face of danger can be more certainly depended upon if 
the individual finds the situation one about which he has previously 
thought and for which he is in part prepared. The school, therefore, 
should give every child in this first period of its work a simple course 
in first aid to the injured, besides emphasizing at every opportunity 
the precaution which should be taken to avoid accidents. 

For example, every child, in this cycle of work, should be taught 
how to start artificial respiration; ^ how to carry the injured; how to 
stop bleeding when a vein or an artery is cut; what to do when a 
person's clothing is on fire; how to treat the common poisons, and, 
more especially, how to prevent any possible chance of taking 
poison ; how to revive a person who has fainted ; what is first to be 
done for serious burns; how to detach a person from a live wire; 
what should be done when the discovery is made that a building is 
on fire ; ^ how to get on and off street cars ; how to avoid danger 
in crossing a street; and, further, it is my belief that every child 
should be taught how to swim, because in the act of learning one 
overcomes the fear of deep water, and thus his presence of mind may 
be relied on in accidents on water. The work of the schoolroom 
in preparation for the common emergencies should not stop with 
mere discussions. Actual demonstrations, wherever possible, should 
be made, and a specific routine in each case drilled upon so thor- 
oughly that there will not be a moment's hesitation on the part 
of any child due to uncertainty or confusion of mind. 

Preparation for general social efficiency, beyond which the schools 
can not go in this first cycle of work, demands, further, that the 
individual shall know how to employ his leisure profitably. It is 
not enough that he have possession of the " tools " of an education ; 
that he speak and write his thoughts with clearness and ease; that 
he know somewhat of his own environment and that of other peoples 
and races ; and that he be placed in possession of that body of infor- 
mation and habits necessary to conserving his health and protecting 
his life; besides all this, the school and home must consciously seek 
to elevate the range of his possible pleasiires, for of necessity these 
comprise a large part of the activities of every well-ordered life. 

1 A simple way is described by Gulick, Emergencies, pp. 126-130. 

2 Two excellent bulletins on fire dangers and the means of prevention are used in the 
schools of Montana. See Clarence Maxis, Dangers and Chemistry of Fire, one for the 
primary schools and the other for grammar schools. (Prepared for the State fire mar- 
shal's department of Ohio.) 



134 KEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

One of the highest aims of the school should be that of raising 
the standards of the pupils respecting their pleasures, and gradu- 
ally thereby to effect a transition from those which are mainly 
physical and sensory in their nature to those which make an intel- 
lectual and spiritual appeal. A distinct and significant gain in the 
life of the individual will have been made when a good opera, a 
fine, wholesome play, an art exhibit, a clean, vigorous athletic con- 
test, a thoughtful sermon or lecture, a good book will draw him 
away from what is cheap and vulgar. Within the fields of music, 
of art, and of literature will be found the content adapted to the 
accomplishment of this high purpose. Through a careful selection 
of material with due regard to the child's development, much can 
be done within the period embraced by the first six grades in laying 
the foundations of interest in and appreciation of the best things 
which these arts have contributed. This will go far toward turn- 
ing the masses toward pleasures of a high order. 

The heart of the work thus outlined is seen to do with the acquisi- 
tion of a learning technique. In method, this requires reliance upon 
repetition and drill — methods peculiarly effective in the formation 
of habits — at once suggesting an interesting correlation with the 
characteristics of the preadolescent stage which the years of this 
cycle cover. This is emphasized by Hall, who, in describing the 
prepubescent period, says: 

Nevei* again wiH there be such susceptibility to drill and discipline, such 
plasticity to habituation, or such ready adjustment to new conditions. It is 
the age of external and mechanical training. Reading, writing, drawing, manual 
training, musical technique, foreign languages and their pronunciation, the 
manipulation of numbers and of geometrical elements, and many kinds of skill 
have now their golden hour; and if it passes unimproved, all these can never 
be acquired later without a heavy handicap of disadvantage and loss. * * * 
The automatic powers are now at their very apex, and they can do and bear 
more than our degenerate pedagogy knows or dreams of.* 

If one were to select a single word which would best express the 
chief demand on the school in this its first period, that word would 
be, perhaps, " literacy." Six years, beginning with the child of 6, is 
too short a time for the school to accomplish much more. Yet if this 
be done the child will have gained from the school the means for 
acquiring an education, even though circumstances compel him at 
this early age to drop from the ranks of his schoolfellows. Under our 
traditonal arrangement of grades the process of securing that which 
the term "literacy" denotes is dragged out over a period of eight 
or nine years; thus the time when habits are most easily formed is 
not utilized to the full, and, again, the habit-forming process, with 
its requisite drill and mechanical repetition, is projected past the 

1 Hall, Youth: lis Education, Regimen, and Hygiene, p. 5. 



THE COURSE OF STUDY THE FIRST CYCLE. 135 

beginning of the period when the child's interest has shifted to con- 
tent and away from form and technique. This failure of the system 
to recognize the fundamental changes which the dawn of adolescence 
ushers in, and to set them off in sharp contrast to those of the pre- 
adolescent age, accounts in considerable measure for the loss of 
interest which is frequently to be noted among the children of the 
upper grades of our elementary schools. It is likewise a factor con- 
tributing to the break in attendance which comes in these years. 

Such are the considerations which have guided in the formation 
of a course of study for the elementary schools of Berkeley, Cal., the 
details of which have been worked out with the able assistance of 
Miss Alma M. Patterson, then supervisor of the elementary schools 
of that city, now of the Los Angeles State Normal School. 



Chapter VIII. 

THE COURSE OF STUDY— THE SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 



Contents. — The secondary period characterized by the phenomena of adolescence — The 
psychic characteristics of adolescence — Application of the criteria of growth stage 
and social mind — Two important tasks of the school: (1) Transmitting race experi- 
ence ; necessary to progress ; a function of the school ; denied by radicals and by indi- 
vidualists ; (2) training for a vocation; general information necessary to a choice; 
tendencies in special training ; nodes for vocational branch lines — In transmitting 
race heritage a survey of the chief departments of knowledge important ; general 
science ; general mathematics ; general history ; literature ; foreign languages ; 
music ; art — Personal and sex hygiene. 



The second and third cj'^cles of work, broken into two equal divi- 
sions of three or of four years, dependent upon whether a given 
community has adopted a six or eight year secondary course, taken 
together cover the years in that period in the life of the youth char- 
acterized by the phenomena of adolescence. These years, according 
to Hall, comprise the most impressionable and, therefore, the most 
educable period, for this is the time, he holds, when new curiosities 
run high ; when susceptibility, plasticity, and eagerness are pervaded 
by the interest to try and to plan in many different directions ; when 
ambitions and ideals of widely divergent types force themselves upon 
the normal individual; when introspection, self-analysis, and self- 
criticism develop with extraordinary rapidity; when both the body 
and the mind are on the qui vive for excitement; when for the first 
time in development a person is animated by adult goals ; when enthu- 
siasm, sympathy, generosity, are at their strongest and best. Such 
a period is full of meaning and of opportunity for the school system 
that has reorganized its machinery and its form to render service 
thereto. 

Applying broadly the criteria of growth stage and of social mind, 
it is noted at once that two important tasks are required of the school 
during this period : The induction of the youth into the storehouse 
of race knowledge, and the giving of specific preparation for the 
w ork which the individual is to follow throughout the years of adult- 
hood. 

Race progress has been achieved because a given generation has 
begun where the preceding one left off. Were it necessary for each 
generation to start at the same level and to work out its salvation 
136 



i COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIED CYCLES. 137 

entirely of itself, progress would be impossible. And even though 
perceptible gain were achieved, its transmissibility would be lost to 
all who come after. As it is, however, the experiences of each gen- 
eration have been organized, systematized, catalogued, labeled; and 
through imitation, speech, the printed page, and the conscious meth- 
ods of institutions created for the purpose, race achievements have 
been made available for each succeeding generation. The genesis of 
the school lay in the recognition of the need of transmitting the body 
of knowledge accumulated by one generation to the youth of the next. 
The development and marvelous expansion of the school among 
civilized races has been due primarily to the faith which people have 
held that through its mediumship this task could best be accom- 
plished. Yet to-day two important groups of thinkers deny that such 
an aim is a legitimate goal to be set up for the school. 

The first of these assert that attempts to understand the past beget 
conservatism and make for a static condition of society. In their 
reaction against the worshipful attitude toward the past which the 
world so long held, they have swung to the opposite extreme and 
would break completely with the past, ignoring all that has been 
crystallized in the form of tradition and custom. 

The second of these groups see in education nothing but the de- 
velopment of the innate capacities and tendencies of the child. 
These look upon the child only as they would upon a growing plant. 
Surround the latter with proper external conditions — sunshine, 
moisture, fertile soil — and leave it alone, the organism itself will do 
the rest. The scholastic content with which the child works does not 
matter; the important thing is that he be permitted to function 
normally. The school must frankly recognize that one of its chief 
purposes is to transmit to the youth that part of the race inheritance 
which the social mind deems important in the preparation for en- 
trance into the life of the adult social group. The period of ado- 
lescence is the period beyond all others when this preparation can 
best be made. To induct the youth, then, into the storehouse of 
human experience must remain, as of old, one of the important func- 
tions of the school in this period of adolescence. 

A second task of consequence rests upon the shoulders of the 
school, viz, making provision for preparation for the vocation to 
be entered. Entering a vocation involves, first of all, the choice of 
a vocation, and then the acquisition of that general or specific prep- 
aration which the standards of success within the vocation demand. 

It is safe to assume that in a very large number of instances the 
adoption of a vocation is altogether a matter of chance and in no 
respect the result of a process of reflection, nor the expression of a 
Judgment based upon a survey of vocations. That such haphazard 



138 EEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

procedure has not worked out disastrously in more instances is 
due to the adaptability of the individual; to the wealth of oppor- 
tunities for profitable occupation which have arisen in this rapidly 
expanding new country; and to the fact that practically all were 
on the same level in respect to lack of special training, thus insur- 
ing to everyone an equal chance. However, as natural resources are 
developed and fully exploited, as population increases and congests, 
as society becomes more highly organized, as specialized training 
becomes more and more a prerequisite for entrance, the oppor- 
tunity for quickly turning from a vocation wherein one is a failure 
to one wherein the individual proves to be highly efficient will 
rapidly become rare. Whatever be the philosophical end which we 
hold to be that of the individual, perhaps nothing ministers to it 
more than the consciousness that, in his chosen work, he is rated a 
success. Such a consciousness makes a man strong in every branch 
of his activity and in every relation in life which he assumes. On 
the other hand, the man Avho has lost confidence in himself, who 
for any reason feels himself a failure, is a pitiful object. Society, 
through every instrumentality at its command, should put forth its 
utmost effort to prevent such a condition. Much in the accomplish- 
ment of this end can be done by the school in connection with giving 
general information on common vocations. Thus a proper and 
effective step will have been taken looking toward the prevention 
of our youth from gravitating later into society's army of " misfits." 

The period of the second cycle, covering the seventh, eighth, ninth, 
and perhaps the tenth years of school life, is preeminently the time 
when such work should be begun, though it need not be terminated 
with this cycle, but extended until the point is reached wdiere the 
youth actually makes a choice and enters upon the specific prepara- 
tion demanded therefor. 

Such information can be conveyed, in part, through systematic 
reading of carefully selected articles assembled with a view to setting 
before the young people of both sexes the salient characteristics of 
the common vocations of the community by which both men and 
women earn a livelihood. Such reading, however, should be sup- 
plemented by lectures given before the assembled student body by 
men and women who are recognized in the community as being suc- 
cessful in their respective callings and who are competent to present 
in pleasing form the advantages, the disadvantages, the opportuni- 
ties, the training required of the particular vocation that they repre- 
sent. In one of the lower high schools of Berkeley, Cal., the principal 
was particularly successful in securing such a series of talks for the 
young people of his school. The following titles arranged by him 
suggest the possibilities, in this respect, open to the schools of every 
community of any considerable size : " What it means to enter the 



COURSE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 139 

ministry," by a prominent clergyman ; " The vocations open to 
women," by a woman who had given much study to the question and 
who herself was a successful business woman; "What the teaching 
profession has to offer," by a successful educator ; " The possibilities 
of the real estate business," by the head of a large real estate firm; 
" The training required of a banker," by the cashier of one of the 
local banks; "The work of a nurse and the training required," by a 
professional nurse ; " The plumbing trade, its scope and possibilities," 
by a master plumber. Such a list can be indefinitely extended and 
modified in any community. The information secured thus, at first 
hand, will go far toward insuring the intelligent choice of a vocation 
when the time comes for taking this most important step. 

Another suggestive feature in this connection worked out by Mr. 
Monroe may not be so feasible in every department. A fully 
equipped printing and binding plant was secured by him and in- 
stalled in the school. The board of education provided an expert 
printer. Under his direction elective courses in printing and binding 
were given, full scholastic credit for the same being allowed to those 
taking the work. The students in the assemblies were required to 
report each lecture. The best summary was sent to the printing de- 
partment and there set up by those having elected the printing course. 
The galley proofs were sent to the English classes and corrected by 
the students as an exercise in language. Copies of the printed report 
were distributed among the students of the school, each being urged 
to take the address home, read it to the parents, and with them dis- 
cuss its contents. 

The giving of the general information of common vocations, then, 
is a step which the school can easily take. When, however, we turn 
from the general information of vocations, and from that general 
preparation, which is equally valuable in all vocations, to the matter 
of providing the special training required by each, the problem is 
much more difficult and complex, and one in which the proper place 
of the school does not yet fully appear. 

In practice, two tendencies have arisen. According to one, the stu- 
dent spends part of his time in his vocation, learning its technique 
under normal conditions, and the remainder of his time in the school 
where the instruction is related more or less closely to his vocation. 
Under the other plan he spends the whole of his time in the school, 
devoting a portion of it to the occupational courses offered by the 
school. 

Examples of the first of these tendencies are to be found in the 
elementary technical schools of the now famous Munich system, the 
" shop schools " in connection with some of the large industrial con- 
cerns in England and America, and in the schools organized after 
the " Cincinnati plan." Examples of a response to the second 
5930°— 16 10 



140 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

thought are to be seen in the familiar trade schools of the United 
States and in the vocational and polytechnic departments of our 
academic high schools.^ 

Those who support the first of these plans and oppose the second 
would make the following assertions : To prepare fully for any con- 
siderable part of the vocations represented in a given community 
would require an equipment prohibitive in cost to most school de- 
partments. It is impossible for the school to simulate closely enough 
the normal and complex conditions under which many vocations 
must be conducted to make the training which it gives of much prac- 
tical value. Moreover, success in a given vocation often depends 
more upon adaptability to conditions that can not be reproduced in 
the school than upon mere laiowledge of technique. Pedagogues 
can not be expected to teach the technique of specialized vocations 
any more than blacksmiths can be relied upon to come into the 
schoolroom and teach Latin. Instead, then, of attempting to bring 
the vocation into the school, they assert the way out lies in taking 
the school to the vocation.^ 

On the other hand, those holding the contrary view assert that 
there are many simple occupations which can be taught w^holly 
within the school ; that the school can systematize, organize, and thus 
give an orderly presentation of the chief elements of an occupation 
more quickly and clearly than can years of work under the stress and 
strain of the activity itself; that opportunity can not readily be 
secured for practical work in the chosen vocation in a given com- 
munity by all who might wish to secure the training ; and that many 
students in our high schools wish opportunity for general polytechnic 
experience without committing themselves wholly to a particular 
occupation. 

The merits of the latter plan are brought out in a statement by 
Charles S. Evans, head of the mechanic arts department of the 
Berkeley (Cal.) schools, who also sets forth in some detail the 
manner in which the work of his department has been organized 
to meet the needs of each of the two cycles into which the secondary 
period has there been broken : 

In the second cycle, from the seventh to the ninth grade, inclusive, the 
argument for manual training is the same as for the first cycle. The boy still 
needs the stimulating, developing influences which manual training affords, 
but with enlarged capabilities and increased muscular strength there is justi- 
fied an added equipment of a more complex nature. At this point a new 
element enters — that of expertness in the use of tools and of understanding and 
relating mechanical processes. 

It would seem hardly necessary to argue that if tools are used at all they 
should be used in the way which experience has proved to be most effective 

1 For a detailed account of the practice in vocational training at home and abroad, see 
Hall. Educational Problems, vol. 1, Ch. VIII. 

2 Burk, in Ladies' Home Journal, March, 1913. 



I 



COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 141 

and economical. Aside from the psychological argument, it is sufficient 
justification for the maintenance of manual training that a boy, no matter what 
his future may be, should acquire a degree of expertness in the use of tools. 

From about the seventh grade on the powers of the student are such that 
the emphasis is placed increasingly on this new factor — technical skill. Hardly 
less than four hours in the seventh and eighth grades and seven and one-half 
hours in the ninth should be devoted to shopwork each week, which may include 
time given to mechanical drawing. By means of carefully planned models, 
the simpler cabinetmaker's and carpenter's cutting and measuring tools are 
brought into use. With the possible exception of the saws, each student should 
learn to sharpen and care for his tools by the time he has reached the ninth 
grade. 

All projects are made from drawings; in some cases a quick freehand sketch, 
but in most instances several " views " are needed. Instruction in freehand 
and mechanical drawing should accompany shopwork and the closest of corre- 
lation maintained between the subjects. In the ninth grade, from two and one- 
half to three and one-half hours per week may be given to drawing, sketching, 
and lettering receiving emphasis throughout the year. The mechanics of 
instrumental drawing, together with the principles of projection and working 
drawings, will furnish a year's hard work. 

An ordinary boy leaving school at this time can not but reflect the years of 
shop discipline and system in increased responsibility, orderliness, and initia- 
tive. He will have acquired something of the power of analysis, also the 
ability to obey exactly, whether the order comes from another or from himself. 

Technically he can use well any of the tools of the carpenter or cabinetmaker. 
He can draw a perspective sketch of a proposed table, make a working drawing 
with instruments, then trace it, and from the blue prints build the table of oak, 
using, besides hand tools, such machines as the surfacer, circular and band saw. 
as well as the jointer. After completing the construction of his chosen article, 
he will scrape and sand it, then fill and varnish it, rubbing down each coat. 

If the boy enters one of the mechanical trades, he finds that a sure foundation 
in training has been laid. If not, he has knowledge of daily application, skill 
of daily need. In any case his adaptability and his capacity to improve have 
been immeasurably increased and his value to his fellows correspondingly 
enhanced. 

The third cycle commences with us at the tenth year of school life and ends 
at the twelfth. The boy is now approaching manhood. Somewhat of his 
responsibilities is looming up before him, and consciousness of strength is dawn- 
ing. In greater degree than ever before life standards should measure his work. 
The standard of workmanship now tends toward that of the commercial world. 

Two lines of procedure are open to the student. One, a " general " course 
covering 10 hours per week for three years, has for its objective familiarity 
with the basic principles underlying a number of trades — carpentry, joinery, 
patternmaking, turning, blacksmithing, molding, foundry practice, machine-shop 
practice, and mechanical or architectural drafting. Drawing occupies one-third 
and tool work two-thirds of the allotted time. While the work here is highly 
technical, the justification, broadly made, is still educational. The " whole boy " 
is now at school. Three-sevenths of his school day is spent in the shop and 
drafting room and four-sevenths in the classroom. 

The second line of procedure is the " special " course, covering about the 
same time as the " general " course, but centering for the major part of the 
three years upon a specialty in which such proficiency may be gained that either 
diz'ectly, as in mechanical drafting, or, after a very much shortened apprentice- 



142 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

ship in certaiu lines of tool work, the boy may enter into the practice of his 
vocation. 

A student in this course finds himself, upon his graduation at 18 or 19, as 
advanced in the technical knowledge of his chosen trade as the apprentice of 
two or three years standing. He knows, moreover, what the apprentice is not 
apt to know — the reasons for things and the underlying science as well, for he 
has had the inestimable advantage of instruction in algebra, geometry, trigo- 
nometry, physics, and chemistry, and he has been taught in the shop as no 
apprentice is ever taught. Further than this, he has studied history and the 
principles of government. He has had a year of bookkeeping, including business 
arithmetic, business papers and accounts, and he has had continuous training in 
writing and speaking the English language. 

It is probable that the complex needs of given communities can 
best be met through a combination of the two plans — through coop- 
eration with industrial concerns, whereby school and vocation shall 
alternate, and through the plan of bringing experts as instructors 
in various occupations into the school, whether it be the trade school 
or the more general polj^technic departments of our high schools. 
Whatever the plan adopted, however, and whatever course the future 
development of the school takes in this respect, it is clear that society 
demands of the school, in addition to transmitting the culture and 
experience of the race, also the duty of helping the youth of each 
generation to choose his occupation wisely and well and to secure 
the requisite special training for success in it. 

The breaking of the secondary period into two cycles — the one 
ending and the other beginning at about the age of apprenticeship to 
the trades, that is at 15 or 16 — obviously facilitates such training 
irrespective of which of the two general plans for securing occupa- 
tional instruction is followed. Such an arrangement provides three 
convenient points for the articulation of the vocational branch lines 
with the main trunk line of secondary education. The first would 
come at the end of the sixth, the second at the end of the ninth 
or tenth grade, and the third preferably at the end of the four- 
teenth grade — that is, at the end of the second year of the tra- 
ditional college course. Vocational offshoots from the main line 
at each of these three joints would provide for the following groups: 
The first, that at the end of the sixth grade, for the children who now 
drop out in the upper elementary grades, enter a business school for 
a few weeks, then drift into occupations requiring no special train- 
ing; the second, that at the end of the ninth or tenth years, for those 
who are headed for technical vocations; the third, that at the end 
of the fourteenth grade, for those who are looking forward to pro- 
fessional careers. By such an arrangement three levels of vocational 
preparation can be secured, and yet, by properly relating the work 
given in each to the " core " running continuously throughout the 
length of the system, no difficulty should be experienced by anyone 



COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 143 

who has stepped aside at a given level in getting back on the trunk 
line whenever it is desired. 

The details of the courses to be offered in these vocational off- 
shoots can be determined only upon the most careful investigation 
of particular occupations by the experts in each. The work, how- 
ever, comprising the " core " of the main line should be linked up 
functionally with that of the vocational courses as closely as possible. 
By so doing not only will the return be made easier, but, what is 
even more important, means will thereby be provided for vitalizing 
a considerable body of culture material by relating it to the con- 
crete. In speaking of the elementary technical schools of Munich, 
an outgrowth of the "continuation schools" of that city, Hall 
describes the training of a chimney sweep, therein given, to illus- 
trate the wide range of knowledge which can be made of direct 
utility when the right connections are established. 

One feels, he says, that a barber, butcher, baker, cobbler, and the 
rest, may be an educated gentleman if he masters his craft. The 
chimney sweep is taught about fireplaces, hearths, stoves, steam, 
and other systems of heating, brick, stone, and other building ma- 
terial, flues, fluted and complex chimneys, their tops, ventilators, the 
physics of air currents and the history of house warming from 
Greece and Rome to our day; he knows all the tools and problems 
of his trade; the chemistry of soot and ash; does problems in tem- 
perature and fuel economics, fireproof construction; studies roofs, 
mortars, devices for reducing smoke and gas, fire extinguishers, 
something of house and especially of chimney construction, laws, 
insurance, police regulations, the use of pitch, plaster, waterspouts, 
etc. ; there is considerable instruction concerning duties, deportment, 
civics, etc. Surely no boy in the later teens who has mastered such 
a course can be called uneducated.^ 

The broad educational possibilities of the so-called "practical" 
courses is also illustrated in the work of Bertha C. Prentiss, head 
of the department of home economics in the schools of Berkeley, 
who, in outlining the courses for girls preparatory to the vocations 
associated with home making, has emphasized breadth of treatment. 
She has described it in the following words : 

Cookery is especially worth while in the first year of the cycle comprising 
the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades, as girls of this age, 12 or 13, are greatly 
interested in active work. Sewing will be more beneficial in the two following 
years, when the girls develop the natural desire to make things for personal 
use and adornment. 

During the first year, then, the work will continue to establish orderly and 
neat habits in housework processes and to arouse an interest in the care of 
the house. The simple cookery problems should be continued with emphasis 



1 Hall, Educational Problems, vol. 1, p. 588. 



144 REOEGAlSriZATION . OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

upon serving and upon the cost of the materials. Where the work in cookery 
is carried into the second and third j'ears of this cycle it should be much 
broader and should include a study of the growth, composition, manufacture, 
and nutritive values of the common foodstuffs, with methods of cooking and 
serving. Elementary laundry lessons, home nursing, and the consideration of 
expenditures in the home should also be included. 

Courses in sewing in this cycle should include a review of hand sewing and 
introduce much machine work. There should be the making of garments, such 
as underwear and the simpler dresses. Commercial patterns should be used 
and their value studied. Textile study should be continued and the pupil 
should gain a knowledge of the relative cost of materials. 

In connection with the actual work of sewing there will be opportunity to 
help in the all-round development of the girl. Good taste and good judgment 
in regard to suitability and adaptability of the materials used can be developed 
and a study made of their value. There will also be opportunity to develop an 
appreciation of the labor connected with sweatshop work and a knowledge of 
the cost of clothing made under decent conditions. There will thus be de- 
veloped an industrial intelligence which will lend dignity to labor. The work 
will also aid in developing the girl in self-reliance and resi^onsibility, especially 
in respect to the home and to the mother. 

Where the work is an elective subject in this cycle, girls often do not realize 
the value of the work, so they fail to take the courses during this most im- 
portant period in their life. At least one year each of cooking and sewing 
should be required of all girls in this cycle. 

While in the average school it is not practicable to teach the various branches 
of this subject from the trade standpoint, a strong foundation can be laid for 
the vocations which provide a livelihood. It should be possible for pupils from 
this cycle to enter any one of several occupations as a small wage earner rather 
than as an apprentice. While the work, then, need not aim at teaching a trade, 
it can have a large place in aiding pupils in choosing a vocation and in earn- 
ing a livelihood, if it is necessary for the pupil to go to work at the close of 
this school period. 

In the third cycle of school work courses in home economics should build 
upon the foundation already laid in the preceding cycles. The study of the 
scientific side of the work should be introduced ; the reasons for the technique 
should be given ; and a study of the economic questions involved should be 
begun. The work here should emphasize the home as a unit of society, and 
the management of the home as a business needing intelligence and special 
training. 

Courses in this cycle should include the advanced problems of cooking and 
sewing, together with a study of nutrition, sanitation, dietetics, and household 
management. Household furnishings and decoration, plain sewing, dressmaking, 
and millinery should also be included. Expenditures should always be con- 
sidered. Textile study should be continued and include the study of materials 
in regard to cost and economy in purchasing. 

A better knowledge of the subjects included under the study of shelter, food, 
and clothing will prevent the common waste through poor buying and through 
the extravagant use of materials which is so prevalent to-day because of the 
lack of special knowledge on the part of the women. Some work in home 
economics should be required of every girl in any high school, whether it be a 
classical, manual training, or polytechnic high school. 

Besides the completion of the practical problems in any line of home 
economics work, there is much thought content to be studied. In garment mak- 
ing is found the opportunity of taking up machine sewing and of studying 



COURSE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIED CYCLES. 145 

its value in relation to hand sewing ; of using commercial patterns ; of studying 
hygiene in relation to wearing apparel; 9f gaining an idea of the suitability 
of apparel in relation to use and to income; of knowing the prices, widths, 
quality, etc., of materials in relation to use ; and of planning the details of the 
wardrobe. 

In the household furnishing and management courses is found the oppor- 
tunity of considering the home in regard to artistic and beautiful furnishings 
and their relation to income; of considering the spirit of home making; of dis- 
cussing its management in relation to the repair of clothing, linen, rugs, and 
the general care of clothing and of house furnishings and the laundering of 
materials; and of studying the economy of time in relation to the making and 
the use of home things. 

In connection with the cookery courses is included a study of the effect of 
heat upon the food principles — protein, fats, and carbohydrates, alone and in 
combination ; experiments with the leavening agents and the effect of these 
substances on digestion ; the preservation of food and the effects of ferments 
and chemical agents in canning and preserving ; the adulteration of foods ; the 
comparative value of homemade and purchased products ; the family dietary, 
with the selection of food to suit different conditions of life; the serving of 
meals with regard to comfort and economy in both cooking and serving; the 
cost of food and meals ; and an understanding of the essential features of good 
marketing. 

In consequence of these courses in home economics, girls are able to make 
undergarments, wash dresses, woolen dresses, and simple evening dresses, either 
for themselves or for another. They know how to buy materials, both in regard 
to suitability and value. They know how to select and care for household 
furnishings and how to cook and serve meals, both in respect to food values and 
to economy of time and labor in their preparation. 

The work in home economics will prepare girls for greater efficiency in the 
occupations connected with the organization of the home by giving them a 
practical knowledge of foods and the proper methods of cooking, and an appre- 
ciation of the practical, economic, and artistic value of the materials of dress 
and household furnishings, together with an appreciation of the proper rela- 
tion to be kept between income and expenditure. The work in home economics 
will, then, have performed its function in each of the three cycles if it has 
helped to raise each pupil to her highest efficiency, both as an individual and 
as a member of society. 

Except for the courses of general rather than of special vocational 
character offered by the departments of mechanic arts and home 
economics, but one other department of the Berkeley schools, the 
commercial department, has as yet attempted to offer occupational 
training, in the narrower sense, for students on the first level of 
vocational training — that is, in the cycle covering the seventh, eighth, 
and ninth grades. One of the lower high schools, that under the 
direction of Principal James T. Preston, is situated in the midst of 
a population comprised of those who gain their living for the most 
part through unskilled labor. In the past, when the children of these 
families reached the sixth grade they began dropping out rapidly, 
and by the time the eighth grade was reached but a handful re- 
mained. Upon examination Mr. Preston found that many of those 



146 REOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

leaving school spent a little time at business " colleges " and then 
drifted into unskilled positions which paid but a pittance. To com- 
pete with the business-school interest, he organized courses in " busi- 
ness arithmetic," " business English," put typewriting in the seventh, 
eighth, and ninth grades, bookkeeping and stenography in the eighth 
and ninth, and commercial law and " elementary banking " in the 
ninth. Along with these special subjects, work in penmanship, in 
history, in geography, in manual training or domestic science, in 
drawing, in music was continued. The effect upon attendance of 
this change in the character of the work offered was immediate, and 
for the first time in the history of the school there developed a large 
ninth-grade class with many individuals declaring their intention of 
going on into the upper high school for more advanced work along 
similar lines. 

In this secondary period it is important that a survey of the chief 
departments of human knowledge be made before the individual 
settles down to an intensive study of lines which are intended to con- 
verge toward his future specialty. The work of the first cycle of this 
period, then, can well comprise the giving of courses in general 
science, general mathematics, general history, literature, courses 
affording a start in the languages for those desiring language study, 
music, art, and, finally, that special knowledge which science con- 
tributes relating to personal and sex hygiene, without which neither 
physical nor moral health can long be conserved. Thus landmarks in 
the chief fields of knowledge will be established which will serve to 
orient the pupil to a degree in the totality of race experience and cul- 
ture. Furthermore, such a survey, extensive and popular rather than 
intensive and narrowly scholarly, harmonizes completely with the 
natural impulses of those entering the period of adolescence which 
demands change, variety, and human interest rather than complete- 
ness and logical arrangement. Again, by passing in procession 
before the student of this age the salient features of the important 
departments of knowledge, opportunity will be given for the determi- 
nation of individual aptitudes and the forming of interests which 
may prove permanent in their enduring, and which also may funda- 
mentally and completely modify the future course of the individual's 
development. Courses such as can be formulated from this point of 
view will provide an excellent "topping off" for those who find it 
impossible to continue their schooling beyond the end of the ninth or 
tenth year, and for those who are able to remain throughout the last 
cycle of the period such courses will give an excellent introduction to 
the more intensive work which can and should be expected in the 
advanced years of secondary school training. 

To divide the field of science, for example, into water-tight com- 
partments, labeling each with the terms physics, chemistry, biology. 



COURSE OP STUDY SECOND AND THIED CYCLES. 147 

botany, physiography, or astronomy, is a procedure that for special- 
ists has a meaning and use, but for young students, indifferent to 'the 
reasons which have led scholars to form these cleavages, but tre- 
mendously interested in the facts and eager for a bird's-eye view of 
the whole, such a device is confusing, misleading, and deadening, and 
accounts for the distaste which many young people form for a field 
of knowledge that should have for them an interest dramatic in its 
intensity. It is not a difficult matter for the broadly prepared teacher 
to develop a course in science that will start with an explanation of 
the common phenomena of one's environment and progress from 
point to point, guided largely by the class interest of the moment, so 
that upon its completion the important conclusions in each of the 
special sciences will have been examined and their value and signifi- 
cance in the familiar things of everyday experience noted. 

So, too, with mathematics. Because there is a special body of 
mathematical truths called algebra, and another body called geom- 
etry, and still a third called trigonometry ; and because it is the cus- 
tom of publishing houses to issue texts dealing with each separately ; 
and because among teachers some like to think that they are spe- 
cialists in one and some in another of these branches, we find our 
courses of study almost universally following the same plan. So in 
our high schools young people are plunged at once into " algebra," 
into " geometry," and later still are offered " trigonometry," and per- 
haps some of the branches of " higher " mathematics. Except for 
the inertia of teachers, it would be possible to provide a course, ex- 
tending, say, over a year, that would comprise the important, yet 
simple, elements of each, arranged in an orderly whole and applied 
to the concrete situations falling within the experiences and intellec- 
tual grasp of the youth of this period. Such a course would accom- 
plish three things: It would, in the pupil's mind, be related to his 
experience, and hence he would see in mathematics an instrument 
of practical rather than of theoretical value; it would serve as an 
excellent introduction to the more highly specialized branches if his 
interest in mathematical study developed; and it would give all the 
mathematics needed by one not wishing to enter technical vocations. 

Such a course is not an easy one to organize, it must be admitted, 
and few steps have as yet been taken in this direction ; nevertheless, 
such a general approach to the specialized branches of mathematics 
is possible and highly desirable. Miss Thirmuthis Brookman, head 
of the department of mathematics of the Berkeley schools, has made 
a hopeful beginning. Her analysis of the problem is as follows : 

The study of mathematics in the public schools of Berkeley is undertaken by 
two classes of pupils — those who need mathematics as part of their equipment 
as efficient citizens and home makers and those needing it as direct preparation 
for the earning of their livelihood. The arrangement of courses offered in 



148 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

mathematics is therefore guided by two principles : First, in the earliest grades 
courses are offered essential to self-preservation, in order that those who leave 
school early may not be unduly handicapped ; second, in order to avoid requir- 
ing pupils to specialize at too early an age, general courses in mathematics aim 
to include the essential principles required by the specialist. By this means 
the average pupil enlarges his horizon by studying mathematics in terms of life ; 
at the same time the future specialist is unconsciously emphasizing the princi- 
ples he will need when he chooses his vocation. 

An analysis of the place of mathematics in life reveals the following classi- 
fication : 

I. Arithmetic of investment and of expenditure: For the masses. — The arith- 
metic of the home and of the business world and of the city, as each affects the 
home. How to increase the earning capacity, insurance, taxes, etc. For the 
specialist. — The arithmetic of trade, of the financial world, and of city. State, 
and Government revenue; bookkeeping, banking, tariffs, etc. 

II. Arithmetic of measurement: For the masses. — The arithmetic of the home 
and of the business and scientific world as they affect the home; house plans, 
division of real estate, map reading, etc. For the specialist. — The arithmetic of 
trade and of the workshop ; freight transportation, furniture making, etc. 

III. Elementary algebra (formulas and equations) : For the masses. — The 
algebra miderlying the general literature dealing with mathematical subjects. 
High and low gears in bicycles, automobiles, etc. For the specialist. — Ability to 
use algebra in the science laboratory and in mechanical construction and com- 
putation. Intensity of light on city streets, revolutions per minute of an electric 
motor, etc. 

IV. Elementary geometry and trigonometry : For the masses. — The principles 
of geometry and trigonometry underlying the general literature concerning 
measurement. Amount of surface in an aeroplane; elementary surveys in rec- 
lamation work. For the specialist. — 1. The principles of geometry and trig- 
onometry useful in the mechanical arts and in advanced mathematics. 2. Prac- 
tice in proving geometrical principles as training in logical thinking and in 
power to grasp abstractions. 

V. Advanced algebra : For the specialist. — 1. The laws of numbers as an intro- 
duction to higher mathematics. 2. The mastery of advanced algebra as train- 
ing for teachers of elementary mathematics. 

From the foregoing analysis two facts stand out clearly. First, that mathe- 
matical training affects two classes — the masses and the specialist. As far as 
possible this distinction is recognized by making mathematics for the masses 
more or less compulsory and that for the specialist wholly elective. 

The second fact revealed by the analysis is that as the mathematics for the 
masses progresses down the list it influences smaller and smaller classes of 
people. This fact has been recognized by drawing a dividing line between the 
years of study in the curriculum. At the end of the eighth grade sufficient 
mathematics has been completed for graduation from the lower high school, and 
also from the upper high school, although an additional year in the latter school 
is strongly recommended. At the end of the eleventh year pupils who have 
studied the subject each term have completed the requirements for a degree 
from the State university in all colleges which do not specialize in mathematics. 

As far as possible the mathematics work in the Berkeley high schools has 
been adapted to the varying stages of the child's development. In the seventh 
grade children have mastered the operations of numbers through fractions 
and decimals, but have not learned to attach a meaning to the same. At 
this age they are frequently sent on errands to the stores and are familiar 
with the prices of sugar, but rarely handle pocket money over 2.5 cents a 
week. The boys may have paper routes or may earn money cutting lawns 
or running errands, but they are usually not old enough to work in stores 
on Saturdays. The work, therefore, consists in handling money in ways that 



COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 149 

are connected with the home. The children learn to keep personal accounts 
and make out bills. They are also required to keep the home accounts of a 
family on an income not to exceed $100 a month. Kent, living expenses, food 
and clothing are at prices set by the children from their own observations. 
If their accounts fail to provide reasonably well for a family and to pur- 
chase a lot at Berkeley prices on the installment plan besides, the work must 
be repeated. In this connection, the amount devoted to philanthropy is con- 
sidered equal to the amount devoted to luxuries. During this work the in- 
stinct to save is fostered by the desire to build a house when the lot is paid 
for. Insurance, taxes, and commission fees appear incidentally in the problem 
of providing for the family. The children keep strict personal accounts, in- 
cluding their clothing and personal exi^enses, which reveal the wonderful 
prominence of the moving picture show. At the end of the year the children 
have a working knowledge of the arithmetic of money from the viewpoint of 
the home and have incidentally received lessons in the value of thrift versus 
extravagance. The problem of providing for the home lighting, furnishing, 
etc., is adapted to the stage of development of the children. If estimates are 
too high for the income, the girls appeal to the sewing and cooking teachers 
to plan their prices in order to get them inside the required limits.^ 

In the eighth grade emphasis is placed upon measurements. In general, 
we find that pupils in this grade travel to a distance from Berkeley, to San. 
Francisco, or to Oakland, etc., much more frequently than those in the seventh 
grade; so the measurements concerning the San Francisco Bay are full of 
meaning to them. Railroad time tables are used extensively for plotting the 
distances of various towns with reference to the Diablo Base Line and meridian. 
Distances on maps are computed according to scale. Latitude and longitude 
of places in the vicinity, as Mount Diablo, Grizzly, and Tamalpais, are computed. 
These are estimated from the maps and are used as the basis for problems 
in measurements. In every case pupils are required to obtain these dimen- 
sions directly from the maps. Lumber in house building, which is constantly 
going on in Berkeley, is computed, using Berkeley prices. Plans and eleva- 
tions for a five-roomed cottage, durable, artistic, and economical, are used as 
the basis, and, wherever possible, pupils measure the lumber in their own 
basements, stair cases, roofs, etc. Squared paper is used for laying out tri- 
angles, parallelograms, etc., and the township map of California is made the 
basis for computing its areas. The children lay out baseball or basket-ball 
fields with the tape line, measure side walks, lots, etc. This work is extended 
in the high eighth grade to include the simple formulas for the measurement 
of solids, which lead naturally to the introduction of simple algebra in so far 
as it concerns understanding simple equations based on measurement. At the 
end of the eighth grade there is given the last of the compulsory work in 
mathematics. This is a six weeks' course in the arithmetic underlying civic 
finances, the bonding of a city, city and county taxes. State and Government 
revenues. This work is deferred as late as possible that the pupil may have 
broadened his experience to get the most from the course. 

The ninth grade mathematics is elective. This is accordingly chosen by pupils 
who expect to graduate from the upper high school. This motive lends dignity 
to the work and eliminates those who have no particular interest therein. It 
includes some who are expecting to use their algebra in the high-school shops 
and who become the authorities of the class in matters pertaining to machinery. 
The main work of the class is the mastery of simple and quadratic equations as 

^ See Brookman, Family Expense Account, for problems in investment and expenditure 
arranged for pupils of the lower high school. 



150 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

they appear in the formulae of the shop and of the physics and chemistry labora- 
tories. Emphasis is placed upon the ability to understand simple formulae as 
they appear in technical magazines, etc. Since so much of the working use of 
mathematics depends upon proportion and variation, these are carried through 
the year and appear in a variety of forms, arithmetic, algebraic, geometric, so 
that the pupil who does not continue his mathematics is equipped with the 
simplest elements of algebraic manipulation in such terms as he may need 
later. 

The tenth year is the first year of the cycle of the upper high school. The 
course outlined plans to give a survey of the facts of geometry, including the 
ability to construct accurately with drawing instruments, to compute, using 
geometric formulae and trigonometric functions, and to read blue prints of 
machinery, house plans, etc.. with intelligence. When a thorough groundwork 
of the facts of geometry in their relations to life has been established, the work 
is followed by training in logic. The usual theorems of plane geometry are 
reduced to a minimum and used as the basis for more original work involving 
careful consideration throughout. This work is deferred as late as possible in 
the year on account of the immaturity of the average pupil. The work in the 
eleventh year concludes the required mathematics demanded by the University 
of California of such students as do not specialize in mathematics. The course 
aims, therefore, to give such knowledge of algebra and trigonometry as will give 
meaning to them as they occur in the reading of the average man, and such 
training as will lay a firm foundation for the specialists who will continue the 
subject. Algebra lays a strong emphasis upon the graphs of equations, statistics, 
and the laws of science. It lays stress upon the ability to use formulae such as 
are found in the handbooks of mechanics and engineers. Trigonometry em- 
phasizes measurement for simple triangulation and surveying rather than 
complex manipulations of formulae. The purpose of this work is to give exer- 
cise in the essentials of the algebraic equation, its graph, and its application in 
surveying, for the benefit of those now stopping the subject and also as an in- 
troduction to higher mathematics. 

Twelfth-year mathematics marks a distinct advance in the difficulty of the 
subject. So one is advised to enter the course only uiwn a display of marked 
mathematical ability during the first six weeks of the work. The class is 
composed chiefly of those planning to become engineers, teachers of mathe- 
matics, or who expect to follow some other specialty. At this stage it becomes 
necessary to rescue the boy who is handy with tools and has therefore hoped 
to become an engineer, but who has displayed no power in mathematics. The 
large number of such who have previously failed in college classes in engineering 
are here given a final test and are advised to take up some work in which 
they have a better chance of success. With the class in senior mathematics 
highly specialized, it becomes possible to do careful, rigorous work in algebraic 
theory, induction, progression, logarithms, etc. In solid geometry the emphasis 
is placed on deductive logic and is kept at a high standard because the class 
is composed of those pupils who have elected mathematics as part of their life 
work. 

No special comment needs to be passed on the courses provided 
in the Berkeley schools for the primary purpose of giving a survey 
of the field of history. The work is clearly summarized by the de- 
partment head, William J. Cooper : 

The work of the history department concerns itself with two blocks : First, 
that of the lower high school ; second, that of the upper high school. In the first 



COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 151 

of these cycles the seventh-year course is entitled general history and geog- 
raphy; the eighth-year course, American history and citizenship; and that of 
the ninth year, history and problems of the Pacific coast. In the upper high- 
school division the tenth and eleventh year courses cover the history of western 
Europe, divided as follows: First semester, ancient period, to 800 A. D.; 
second semester, medieval period, to 1500 A. D. ; third semester, struggle for 
religious and political rights, to 1815; fourth semester, the growth of democ- 
racy, nineteenth century; and in the twelfth year, the time is given over en- 
tirely to the course, United States history and Government. 

The student should realize the antiquity of the race; what it has accom- 
plished ; that his own nation is only one element in the world ; and that each 
nation should have certain ideals in dealing with its own citizens and with 
other nations. The object of each particular course in the history department 
must keep the general ideal of history in mind, and in addition must take some 
one step forward in realizing it. 

What history content shall be given the lower high-school division? The. 
student who graduates from the ninth grade of the public schools should be 
equipped with a knowledge of some of the most important names and facts in 
the development of our present-day civilization. For that reason we give him 
a year's course in general history and geography. It is the belief of an ever- 
growing part of history students that the time concept is not within the reach 
of students of this age. The place concept, however, can be grasped by all, and 
in addition to the names, Alexander, Csesar, Charlemagne, and others with 
which he is made familiar, comes the geographical knowledge of the parts of 
the earth in which man has developed his greatest civilization. We intend to 
make pupils more intelligent readers of books and magazines and newspapers 
and more intelligent and appreciative listeners to lecturers of worth in their 
later years. 

In addition, we feel that the fundamental facts in the history and develop- 
ment of our own country are absolutely essential ; also, the history and prob- 
lems of our own locality. For this reason we will give them some training in 
the most important facts in the United States' history and in the machinery 
by which the United States is governed, and let them know that the problems 
of government in the future are going to be more closely involved with eco- 
nomic and industrial conditions than ever before, and that more time will 
therefore be needed on these phases of it with students who are to be voters 
within two years from the time they leave us. 

Seventh year (General History and. Geography). — Pupils who are to leave 
our school system should at least be familiar with the great names in history, 
and in addition should understand what is meant by such expressions as " The 
Protestant Reformation," " The Crusades," " Italian Renaissance," etc. In 
order to appreciate the rights we enjoy, they should at least know that there 
was a struggle in western Europe for the religious rights that we now have and 
for the most fundamental of our present-day civil and political rights. Pupils 
in this grade are too young to understand history in itself; that is, they can 
not grasp the meaning of cause and effect. After completing this course they 
should be able to read newspapers and magazines more intelligently. They 
ought to be readers of better books because the references of these writers will 
be known to them and if they are not familiar with some of the names they 
run across in their reading, they will know where to go to learn. They should 
be more intelligent listeners to those who will address them in lectures, politi- 
cal speeches, sermons, and so on. In a word, this course should so work itself 
out as to create a demand for a higher grade of reading and entertainment. 



152 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

and the knowledge of the great men of other nations and races will in itself 
work against provincialism. 

Eighth year (American History and Citizenship). — Some attention to Ameri- 
can history in the last year of the grammar-school course is required by State 
law. The student must know the fundamental facts in the history of his 
country and should be brought to see somewhat clearly our foreign policy, 
tariff policy, and the fact that a particular tariff is not a. panacea for all our 
political ailments. He should understand to some extent the history of the 
civil service and the movement for reform, and be led to appreciate the oppor- 
tunities for further application of the merit system, both in the nation and in 
the local government ; the pension system, its object, its cost, effects and abuses, 
and congressional appropriations and their abuses. This course should make 
him civicly healthy. It should make him a more vigilant citizen. 

Ninth year (History and Problems of the Pacific Coast). — This course is now 
being worked out for the first time. The theory is that students whom we shall 
turn out of our schools will probably, for the most part, live on the Pacific 
coast, and so we believe that each should know something of the early history 
of his own State, of what it has cost to accomplish what we have accomplished, 
and of the mistakes we have made, and in addition that we should teach 
something in a brief way of the neighboring States and of the struggles and 
ambitions of the Latin American civilization to the south of him. It is the 
intention to discuss the problems of the entire Pacific coast, but especially with 
reference to those of our own State. In the second semester of the course will 
come up such problems as: The problem of oriental immigration, the value of 
the commerce of the Orient and of the Latin republics, the importance of 
Alaska and the islands, etc. The great difiiculty to be overcome by the prepa- 
ration of outlines by members of the department is the lack not only of text- 
books, but of any systematically arranged material upon which to draw. 

Tenth year (History of Western Europe). — ^The first semester of the tenth 
year is devoted to the ancient period and will follow for about five or six weeks 
a summary prepared by the department teachers. Reading will also be carried 
on in the library on the Greeks, and what they and other eastern peoples have 
contributed to western civilization. The political history will begin with Rome 
at the period of the Punic Wars, putting special emphasis upon the cause of 
failure in the Republic, upon the civilization of the ancient period, and upon 
the elements contributing to the downfall of the Roman Empire. The most 
important points in English history will likewise be taken up. The second 
semester will begin with the period of Charlemagne and treat the feudal system 
and the growth and importance of the church, with some attention to the be- 
ginning of national life, bringing the history down through the Italian Re- 
naissance. 

Eleventh year (History of Western Europe). — The first semester is devoted 
to the period of religious wars and the beginning of religious freedom ; the 
development of strong monarchies and the beginning of the struggle for civil 
and political rights, culminating in the French Revolution. The work of this 
period ends with the downfall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna in 1815. 
The second semester's work deals essentially with the nineteenth century ; the 
growth of commerce and industry, and the remarkable spread of the idea of 
democracy. It brings the history of Europe down to the present day. 

m this two-year course in the history of western Europe students will have 
the opportunity of realizing the place of cause and effect in history. They 
will become familiar with the great names of history and learn that the entire 
civilization of the race is not lodged within the boundaries of our own Nation. 



COUESE OF ST-UDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 153 

Upon finishing ttiis course tbey should have a live interest in European affairs, 
be readers of histories and magazines, and of the foreign pages of the 
newspapers. 

Twelfth year (History and Government of the United States). — This course 
deals with the facts in American history in more nearly a true historical 
perspective than does the course in European history, which, it will be noted, 
gives more attention to the nineteenth century than to any other like period 
of years. The second semester of the course is devoted entirely to the history 
of the country since the Civil War, with a good deal of attention given to the 
problems which have faced us in the way of the tariff, civil service, money, 
trusts, etc. In a word, the functions of government are considered of more 
importance than the machinery of government, and only so much attention Is 
devoted to the latter as is necessary to enable future citizens to operate the 
Government intelligently. This course, then, is designed essentially for the 
training of those who will vote within a couple of years at most. 

The purposes, as well as a summary of the content, of the English 
courses which are being developed in the Berkeley schools to conform 
to the reorganization plan of the school system are set forth by 
Miss Fannie McLean, the department head : 

The English of the lower high school includes structural and cultural 
English ; the study of the mother tongue, to the end of using it with vigor and 
ease; and the reading of noble literature, to the end of establishing a lasting 
desire for such reading. 

It is assumed that in the first cycle of six years the pupil, through imitation 
and habit, has become possessed of a correct and simple expression of the 
thoughts of childhood. Imitation and habit continue to be potent teachers in 
the seventh, eighth, and ninth years, and an attempt is made to create notice- 
able progress in correct usage by assigning to each semester a definite number 
of grammatical constructions of peculiar difiiculty, of words easily misspelled, 
and of conventional forms in writing. • 

The reasoning faculty, however, is now added to imitation and habit, for 
the pupil is at the right age to understand why one usage is correct and 
another incorrect. The same reasons that make this a good time for beginning 
the study of a foreign language make it an opportune time for analytical work 
in the use of the mother tongue. This introduction of the reasoning element 
distinguishes the language work of the lower high school from that of the 
first six years. The child has become a youth and craves self-conscious power 
in his use of English. 

Somewhere on the road between the simple activity of early school life and 
the vivid, many-hued interests of the high school, pure, spontaneous, creative 
imagination, except in a few cases, is lost. In all probability this change is 
wrought in the seventh or eighth years of the school life, and could largely be 
prevented by proper composition assignments. That type of pupil is the despair 
of high-school teachers, who invariably asks when given a composition theme, 
"Where shall I read up about it?" The empty words of a perfunctory paper 
prove too clearly how atrophied the imagination has become. The ethical 
significance of such a state is comprehended when we reflect that most of the 
misunderstanding between people of different classes and trades, even in 
America, is due to lack of imagination, rather than to intentional unkindness. 
It is right at this point, then, that the childish imagination, beginning to wane, 
must be resuscitated into social imagination and foresight. The pupil's com- 



154 REOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

position exercises stiould be such as to necessitate his putting himself into 
the place of another or into some future place of his own. 

Letters of friendship, invitations, courteous letters of gratitude, applications 
for summer boarding places or for summer work, the answering of real adver- 
tisements, the composing of graphic advertisements, open letters to the daily- 
press or to the school paper on current topics, descriptions of interesting jour- 
neys or trips, comparisons of persons in stories to persons in real life, accounts 
of visits to factories or stores, writing of minutes of class meetings, discussions 
of school ethics, the telling of stories to illustrate some moral concept of the 
pupil — these are a few of the forms that social composition may take and 
continue to nurture the imagination while it relates the pupil to actual life. 
Accurate reports of what the pupil has read or heard are necessary, but such 
assignments should be given sparingly, and only under conditions that preclude 
the danger of plagiarism. 

Since the lower high-school pupils are in no sense being trained as authors, 
the social aspects of their written and oral expression are of paramount 
importance. 

The study of literature has two marks of distinction in the lower high school. 
First, the classroom reading of mastei"pieces becomes more intense, and there- 
fore the number of selections smaller, while the home reading becomes broader 
and more varied. Secondly, the literary taste begins to take on a conscious 
development ; the pupil, vaguely at first, and then more clearly, knows why he 
likes one piece of literature and not another, and struggles upward in awkward 
and touching attempts to express himself in the picturesque language or in 
the simple terseness of his favorite author, or to reach standards of admired 
excellence in his character. The boys become new Horatiuses, and long for 
bridges to cross ; the girls are new Evangelines, and seek to add courage to 
gentleness; and boys and girls together live in a new woi"ld remote from their 
own, but strangely like it. This reading and the practically imaginative com- 
position described in a previous paragraph unite in developing the imagination 
from childish crudity to social helpfulness. 

The masterpieces studied in the classroom are divided into three groups, sat- 
isfying three demands of the growing literary hunger of the youth, and har- 
monizing with the histoi*y course of study, so that literature has its historical 
background and history its literary expression. 

The first group comprises some early forms of literature, as the child's rightful 
human heritage. These are the simple, purely classical, and strongly imagi- 
native forms ; such as heroic epics, lays, and ballads. They are correlated with 
the study of world history.. 

The second group comprises American poems, stories, speeches, and essays, 
as the child's rightful national heritage, in order to inculcate principles of good 
citizenship and intelligent pride in his country. This work is correlated with 
the study of United States history. 

The third group comprises English drama and romance as the child's rightful 
race heritage. Shakespeare and Scott are taken as the chief exponents of this 
form of literature. The short story is made a part of this year's course, as it 
is also of the seventh and eighth years. 

If the pupil should leave school at the end of the lower high school, he 
would, through the classroom study of these masterpieces, and through his 
home reading from the supplementary list furnished, be well started on the 
road to culture. In other words, he would be in an attitude of mind conducive 
to further intelligent reading, because his interpretative and reasoning powers 
would have been liberated and his literary taste cultivated. He would have 
the beginnings of a comprehension of the relation of literature to history as 



COUESE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIED CYCLES. 155 

one of tlie most significant human products of a nation's civilization. And, 
best of all, contact with literature would have awakened, even at this early 
age, new ethical ideals, a social imagination, and a spirit of reverence for true 
greatness. 

If his schooling ends now, he has established a permanent friendship with 
books, which magazines and newspapers alone will not satisfy. Bnt, to prevent 
his separating literature from life, and to enable him to see the fineness, the 
beauty and the opportuneness of our best periodical literature, magazine read- 
ing is made a part of the course. The expository literature of the day, as seen 
in the articles upon social and economic questions — city planning, children's 
playgrounds, George Junior Republic, and similar topics — can be made use of, 
not only in relating the pupil to the best of the life of his times, but in show- 
ing him that the style of a piece is of service to the cause presented. In this 
he sees a practical reason for the study of English. He learns that such study 
is needed to perfect a social being and to make of him a citizen of the world. 

In the upper high school the problem is a different one from that of the lower 
high school. Here the boys and girls are not only preparing to be potentialities 
in the world's business and social life, but they already feel themselves to be 
part of that life. The tide of the greater outside world flows through the high 
school, and though it is there only in creeks and bays, it is the same salt and 
tonic element that pervades the ocean outside. The high-school pupils have 
their party strifes and prejudices, their social gatherings, their student govern- 
ment, their public press, their dramatic entertainments. The problem that pre- 
sents itself to the English department is this : How can the literature and compo- 
sition be made to fix the attention of the pupils on the permanent soul of beauty 
and excellence underlying these " shows " of things, and also equip them with 
the means of moving with confident ease and power in the life of their fellows? 
How can we widen their vistas of life and make attractive to them the enduring 
ideals of humanity? If the study of English can make them self-poised indi- 
viduals and social centers in the school life, they will continue to be such, 
whether they are graduated from the high school into the university or into 
business. 

The composition of the upper high school, besides emphasizing, throughout 
the three years, by continual practice, oral and written, and by continual 
analysis, the principles and habits of a correct and vigorous style, begins now 
to adapt itself to the needs of individual pupils and of small classes of pupils. 

The special composition classes, which are to increase in number as rapidly 
as school conditions will permit, are to serve four purposes. The first is to 
correct and strengthen the style of those pupils noticeably below the standard 
in matters of form or of expression by giving them special attention. The 
second is to train such pupils as show peculiar literary ability in the elements 
of some form of. literary composition — journalism, short story, essay, poem, 
or drama. In the student body, there are, at any one time, almost sure to be 
some few pupils who are fit for such instruction and can make use of it. 

The third purpose is to adapt the composition work to the business or pro- 
fessional plans of the pupils, many of whom have already chosen their life 
work. The pupil who is to be a clergyman is given a theme on Hull House 
to write ; the pupil who is to be a physician is given a theme on the sanitary 
aspects of the disposal of garbage ; the pupil who is an artist writes on maga- 
zine illustrations and accompanies her article with illustrations of her own; 
the girl who likes dressmaking writes on costumes and illustrates her composi- 
tion with colored pictures. Plans, diagrams, maps, and pictures are all en- 
5930°— 1& 11 



156 EEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

couraged as a valuable part of the compositions. We have been surprised to 
find how this has increased the interest in the theme work. 

The fourth purpose is to enhance the usefulness of all the pupils by prac- 
tice, oral or written, in such papers and addresses as will be expected later 
from them at public meetings, at meetings of civic, literary, or social clubs, 
at dinners, at conventions, and at other public occasions. The student gather- 
ings and school oi'ganizations are made use of in this part of the work, and the 
pupils still have enough of the play instinct to enjoy transferring the class 
hour into the occasion desired and playing their parts. 

Whatever the special form of the composition may be, two principles are 
adhered to : That nothing which lacks sincerity is worth saying; and that what- 
ever is worth saying, is worth saying well. 

Training in the use of the public library, debating, presentation of class 
plays, the reading and writing of short stories, the study of high-school 
journalism (its problems, materials, arrangements, and management) are all 
features of the new high-school course in English, and are related to the 
spontaneous school activities of the pupils. 

To give the pupils the background of our literary past and the large per- 
spective that comes from looking at life through the eyes of such great masters 
as Chaucer, Shakespeare, Addison, Burke, Macaulay, and Webster, is the 
definite purpose of the course in literature. 

Two truths are gained from this study : First, that all the greatest writers 
were essentially democrats and expressed freely the growing ideals of their 
time; and second, that since life is the field of literature, our own time must 
possess a literature of far more transcendent importance to us than any litera- 
ture of the past. 

From these two truths the pupils are lead to a third. It is this : They can 
assist in making literature of their generation a noble one, both directly and 
indirectly ; directly, if they have the creative literary instinct ; indirectly, if 
they have the morality, the intelligence, and the sense of the beauty of things 
which are necessary to build up a social life worthy of expression in current 
literature. They make literature in either case — the literature itself, or the 
material for literature. 

Such reasoning, more or less conscious in the minds of the pupils, forms the 
basis for the comparative study of the old masterpieces and current literature, 
even in its most modern and vital form, the periodical. The study of the early 
novel culminates in the supplementary reading of one of to-day's best novels. 
The study of the eighteenth century essay culminates in the study of the 
articles in our best magazines. The study of Shakespeare culminates in the 
reading of Maeterlinck's Blue Bird. The study of Milton's Sonnets culminates 
in the reading of Richard Watson Gilder's Sonnets. 

If the pupils should have no further schooling, they would leave the high 
school furnished with the touchstone of true literature. They would be able to 
discriminate between what is worthy of study in modern writing, because it 
nobly expresses the elevated and enduring aspects of our present social life, and 
what is worthy of only cursory reading, because it expresses, without the 
strength of art, the transitory aspects. 

It has too long been taken for granted that only future generations can sepa- 
rate the wheat from the chaff in the literature of the epoch. Even in the upper 
high school some literary connoisseurship can be acquired, which maturity of 
years and habitual reading will ripen. The cultivation of this literary art sense 
in order to apply it to present-day literature is an important practical result of 
the study of literature. The to-day of literature should be made ours as well 



COUKSE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIED CYCLES. 157 

as tlie yesterday, for through it we enter into the ricliest part of the life of 
our times. 

In our English course we have tried to keep in mind that if these young 
people had elected business life or domestic life instead of school life, they 
would have found these years between the ages of 16 and 18 full of novel 
experience and shot through with the glory of doing things. Days of work in 
shop or office would have been paid for in money instead of with credits, and 
some of that money would have been transmuted into evening pleasures. Days 
of housework would have shown tangible results in dainty cookery or in neat 
furnishings, or in the pride of entertainment. So, if the high school robs the 
youth of the rich experience that active life in the world affords, it must offer 
a golden substitute that shall place the youth, on graduation, where he would 
have been with such world experience, but place him there equipped with keener 
vision, with warmer heart, and with readier hand, because of his education. 

The English course must do its share, and that a large one, in bringing about 
this result. English teachers are only beginning to work out this new social 
plan in the study of literature and composition. 

The next item listed in the summary of the chief fields of human 
knowledge (p. 146) , a survey of which it is the business of the school 
to give in the secondary period of school training, is that of the 
languages. Without considering the merits of the endless contro- 
versy which has raged down through the ages over the question of 
the value, or lack of it, of the study of foreign languages, there is a 
reason, not generally given, which seems to justify fully the offering 
of courses in the principal ancient and modern languages. This re- 
lates to the possibility that in the study of linguistics some student 
will find the thing for which he is peculiarly fitted. 

If this period in the development of the youth is to be looked upon 
as a testing time, and as a time when he is to be given a chance to 
" try his hand " at a variety of activities, then, among others, he 
should have the opportunity of determining, at first hand, whether 
or not he has a bent for the study of language and of related lines. 
There is no reason for opening the door to science, to mathematics, 
to history, to literature, from this point of view, and locking it 
against the languages. Many men and women secure their liveli- 
hood, directly or indirectly, through their special Imowledge of 
language, just as there are many workers in each of the other depart- 
ments whose special technical knowledge brings to them financial 
recompense. The world needs the scholar quite as much as it needs 
the artisan and the man of general business. The public school, if it 
function to the maximum in the life of the individual as well as of 
society, must make it possible for the potential artisan, the potential 
scientist, the potential linguist, to find himself. In theory, at least, 
the school should be able to open the eyes of every individual, that 
he may have a vision of himself in the completeness of his powers. 
This reason alone is sufficient to justify the offering of study in the 
field of language, though such study should not be made compulsory 



158 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

upon all nor should it be continued beyond the point when it is clear 
that the individual possesses no aptitude or liking for it. 

The earlier in the life of the pupil that this chance be given the 
better, for the golden hour of language study comes early, and when 
once passed the acquisition of a foreign tongue is well-nigh impos- 
sible. The seventh grade is not too early for the beginning of such 
study; indeed, if it were practicable, an earlier beginning than this 
even is desirable. However, by commencing with the seventh grade 
and continuing throughout the full secondary period of six or eight 
years, a high degree of mastery can be secured by those who develop 
an interest in such study. It need scarcely be said that this work 
should be directed by a vivacious teacher, who speaks the language 
fluently, and that the grammar of the language- should be kept inci- 
dental and unobtrusive. It will be found, too, that the conversational 
method of language teaching is not limited to the modern languages, 
but that it can be used in the study of Latin with excellent results if 
the teacher herself has such ready command of the language as con- 
versation therein demands. 

Aside from the reason for the giving of courses in music and art, 
advanced in the discussion of the work of the first cycle, the argu- 
ment just set forth for the study of the languages holds with equal 
force in the realms of music and art. Suggestive steps in the organi- 
zation of these departments, to conform to the plan of school organi- 
zation in operation in the Berkeley schools, have been taken by the 
department heads. Miss Victorine Hartley and Miss Zinie Kidder, 
respectively. The space limits of this chapter, however, preclude a 
description of their work other than to mention an interesting plan 
which Miss Hartley is trying out by which the school recognizes in 
terms of credits the musical work done in the home, if it measures up 
to a required standard of excellence.^ 

A particular group of truths contributed by the workers in one of 
these fields — ^the field of science — should be brought home to the 
young people of the adolescent age with particular emphasis because 
of the effect which it will have upon the physical and moral health 
of the youth of both sexes. This group of scientific truths comprises 
those facts which relate to personal and sex hygiene. A knowledge of 
one's own body and, in particular, of those functions having to do 
with reproduction is essential to both health and morality. Such 
knowledge imparted to the adolescent by specialists who hold sane 
views on these matters will help A^ery greatly in the movement toward 
the development of a better and stronger and more moral race. 

1 For a description of the plan and the conditions upon which school credit is granted, 
see Appendix, p. 170. See also Educ. Bull., 1914, No. 33, Music in the Public Schools, 
pp. 44-46. 



COURSE OF STUDY SECOND AND THIRD CYCLES. 159 

That the imparting of such knowledge is highly desirable there 
can be no serious question. Eegarding the best method of procedure 
in accomplishing this purpose, however, there is much reason for 
hesitation. A series of carefully prepared lectures, one given to the 
girls by a woman physician and one to the boys by a man, with oppor- 
tunity for individual consultation in private, as a tentative step 
worked well in the Berkelej^ department. The success of this work, 
however, as well as this or any other plan, rests in unusual degree 
upon the personality^ of the individuals imparting the information. 

Two tasks, then, the criteria demand of the school in the secondary 
period, the giving of that information, general and specific, by which 
a livelihood can be secured, and through which each individual will 
find a useful place for himself in the world of activity, and the trans- 
mission of the culture and significant experience of the race, in the 
doing of w^hich a degree of familiarity will be gained with the chief 
bodies of knowledge — science, mathematics, history, literature, lan- 
guages, music, and art. In method, first a survey giving orientation, 
followed by more intensive work along lines intended gradually to 
focus upon the specialty chosen, is the proper procedure. Breaking 
the secondary period into two divisions, the first having to do pri- 
marily with the giving of a general view, the second with more in- 
tensive work, is an arrangement of machinery which the school will 
find effective in the accomplishment of the two-fold task set it by 
psycho-physical growth stage and by social mind. 



53 



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162 



REOKGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 






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164 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Garfield Juniob High School,^ Richmond, Ind. — Couese of Study. 



Subjects. 


Hours 
per week. 


Credits 
per term. 


Subjects. 


Hours 
per week. 


Credits 
per term. 


7 B term. 

Required work: 

English 


8 
5 
5 
2 

1 
2 
2 

5 
5 
5 
5 

8 
6 
5 
2 
2 
2 
1 

5 
5 
5 
5 


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1.0 
1.0 

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.2 

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.4 

1.0 
1.0 
1.0 
1.0 

1.6 
1.0 
1.0 
.4 
.4 
.4 
.2 

1.0 
1.0 
1.0 
1.0 


8 B term. 

Required work: 

English 


8 
5 
5 
2 
2 
2 
1 

5 
5 
5 
5 

8 
5 
5 
2 
2 
2 
1 

5 
5 
5 
5 


1.6 






1.0 




History 

Music 


1.0 


Music 


.4 


Drawing 


Drawing 


.4 


Woodwork or sewing 

Physical training 


Woodwork or cooking 

Physical training 


.4 
.2 


Elective, choose one! 

Latin 


Elective, choose one^ 

Latin 


1.0 


German 


German 


1.0 


English composition 

Industrial work 


English composition 

Industrial work 


1.0 
LO 


7 A term. 

Required work: 

English 


8 A term. 
Required work: 


1.6 


Physiology 


Arithmetic 


1.0 


History.. 


Civics 


1.0 


Music 


Music 


.4 


Drawing 


Drawing 


.4 


Woodwork or sewing 


Woodwork or cooking 


.4 
.2 


Elective, choose one: 

Latin 


Elective, choose one: 

Latin 


1.0 




German 


LO 


English composition 

Industrial work 


English composition 

Industrial work 


1.0 
1.0 









1 At the time of writing this school included only the seventh and eighth grades; the ninth was to be 
added. 

Notes. 

Time schedule. — The hours are 50 minutes each. The time scheduled for the different 
subjects Includes the time spent in preparation in school. 

Credits. — Twenty-two credits are required for promotion to high school. A pupil must 
not be back two credits in any one subject. 

English. — Under this head are included reading, grammar, composition, spelling, and 
penmanship. Five of the eight hours scheduled for the subject are given to recitation 
work, and, in addition to the three hours in school for preparation, some home work is 
usually necessary. 

Latin and German. — Two high-school credits are given for the work in these subjects 
In Garfield, and pupils who have also taken the German work in Hibberd, or its equiva- 
lent, receive three. No pupils are admitted to Latin and German classes unless their 
work has been strong in the preceding grade, and all their work must be kept up to a 
high standard or they are required to change. 

Industrial work. — There is no attempt to teach trades, but merely to give pupils some 
experience that will enable them to choose an occupation more intelligently. The work 
is also found to give an added zest to school life for many boys and girls who show little 
interest in the academic studies. 

Orchestra. — To be admitted to this organization a pupil must have taken some prelimi- 
nary lessons on the instrument he wishes to play. A few instruments are owned by the 
school and loaned pupils for use both in taking lessons and in the orchestra work. 
Members are required to attend practice regularly, and also to attend whenever the 
orchestra is on duty. A credit of four-tenths Is given for each term if the work has been 
satisfactory. 



APPENDIX. 



165 



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EEOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 



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APPENDIX. 169 

Berkeley (Cal.) Public School Department — Lower High Schools Course.* 



SEVENTH GKADE. 



Pds. 



EIGHTH GEADE. 



Pds. 



NINTH GBADE. 



Pds. 



Required. 



English: 

Language 

Composition 

Spelling ". .. 

Reading 

Literature 

Geography and world history 
through biography 

The arithmetic of the house- 
hold and of trade 

Cooking or manual training. . . 

Freehand drawing 

Music and chorus 2 



Optional. 



French — beginning . 
German — beginning 
Latin — beginning. . . 
Spanish — beginning 

Printing arts 

Typewriting 

Stenography 



Required. 



English: 

Language , 

Composition , 

Spelling , 

Reading 

Literature 

American history and citi- 
zenship 

The arithmetic of measure- 
ments 

Sewing or manual training. 

Freehand drawing 

Music and chorus^ 



Optional. 



French— continued. 
German — continued 
Latin — continued . . 
Spanish — continued 

Printing arts 

Typewriting 

Stenography , 



Required. 



English: 

Language 

Composition. . 

Spelling 

Reading , 

Literature 

World's work and 
Pacific coast 
problems 



Music and chorus 2. 



Elective. 



French— begin- 
ning or con- 
tinued 

German — b e g i n - 
ning or con- 
tinued 

Latin — beginning 
or continued .... 

Spanish—begin- 
ning or con- 
tinued 

Algebra 

Freehand drawing 

Elementary house- 
hold arts 

Elementary house- 
hold science. . 

Manual arts 

Printing arts. . . 

Bookkeeping. . . 

Stenography... 

Typewriting... 



1 In effect January, 1910. 

2 The 80 minutes of the music course are divided into two 25-minute recitation periods and one 30-muiute 
chorus period. 

Notes. 



1. The periods are 40 minutes long. In those subjects which require preparation out- 
side the recitation period, five periods per week for a year constitute a course, for which 
one credit is given. In other subjects, five double periods per week are required for the 
full credit. When single periods are devoted to such subjects, one-half credit only is 
given. 

2. A grammar-school diploma is issued when a pupil has finished the required seventh 
and eighth grade course. 

3. Any one of the optional subjects taught, in the school may be substituted for one- 
half of the required work in English. 

4. Pupils who complete any course in addition to the amount required for a grammar- 
school diploma will be allowed credit for such work toward graduation from the high 
school. 

5. To enter the upper high school, a pupil must have secured a grammar-school 
diploma and at least three high-school credits. These credits must represent a full year's 
work in each subject and not an addition of half credits. Exceptions to this rule can be 
made only in special cases upon the joint recommendation of the principals of the two 
schools concerned. 

6. For special instruction in voice culture, piano, violin, drawing, and painting one- 
half of a high-scho(51 credit may be given in each of the seventh and eighth grades ; one 



170 REOEGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

high-school credit in the ninth grade, provided that application for such credit be made 
during the first two weeks of a term, and that evidence of sufiicient progress be shown 
at its close. All work of this character, for which credit is desired, shall be under the 
inspection of the supervisors ol music and drawing. Said credit will count toward high- 
school graduation, but not toward university matriculation. 

7. No class will be organized or maintained unless at the beginning of the term it 
numbers 20 or more pupils ; provided, that a course which is a continuance of one 
formerly begun may be maintained if it numbers 15 or more pupils, and provided that 
no class shall be suspended before the year's work is completed unless the subject is 
being given at another intermediate school in the city. 

Berkeley (Cal.) School Department — The Course in Applied Music' 

The School Department of Berkeley will grant credit for work in music done 
outside of its schools in accordance with the following resolution of the board of 
education : 

For special instruction in voice culture, piano, violin, drawing, and painting, 
one-half of a high-school credit may be given in each of the seventh and eighth 
grades; one high-school credit in the ninth grade, provided that application for 
such credit be made during the first two weeks of a term, and that evidence of 
sufficient progress be shown at its close. All work of this character for which 
credit is desired shall be under the inspection of the supervisors of music and 
drawing. Said credit will count toward high-school graduation, but not toward 
university matriculation. 

CONDITIONS ON WHICH CREDIT WILL BE GRANTED. 

1. The applicant must be enrolled in the lower high-school department of the 
Berkeley public schools. 

2. The applicant must present, during the first two weeks of a given term, 
an application for permission to enroll among those who are to work for the 
credit. This application must be accompanied by a written statement, signed 
by both the applicant's teacher and parent, that they agree to the conditions of 
the course and that they will conform thereto. 

3. The applicant must understand that taking this course will not excuse him 
from the regular course in vocal music offered in the public schools. 

4. The minimum number of hours of practice shall be one hour per day, six 
days in the week. It is understood that the lesson time will count toward satis- 
fying this requirement. 

5. At the conclusion of a given term or year each applicant for credit must 
present a report from his teacher of music covering the following ix)ints : 

(a) Number of lessons taken since last report. 
(6) Average number of hours of practice per week. 
( c) Technical progress made by pupil since preceding report. 
id) List of compositions studied by pupil, with remarks concerning scope 
and ability of work done on each composition. 

6. Each applicant must satisfy the supervisor of music of the public schools 
in respect to — 

(a) Knowledge of the technical work covered, 
(ft) Ability to execute the compositions studied. 

1 In effect January, 1911. 



APPENDIX. 171 

Beekeley (Cal.) Public Schools — Elementary Division. 
Schedule of the weekly time allotment. 



Subjects. 


I 


II 


III 


IV 


V 


VI 


Reading and literature 


400 
100 
95 


300 
150 
75 
60 
30 
60 


240 
200 
80 
60 
30 
60 


240 

150 
80 
70 
30 
90 
85 

220 
30 
50 
60 
85 
75 

150 

1,415 

85 

1,500 

3 


200 
170 
80 
70 
30 
120 
120 
200 
30 
50 
120 
85 
75 
150 
1,500 


200 


English 


160 


Penmansiiip 


60 


Spelling 


70 


Ethics 


30 


25 


History 


140 


Geography 




135 


Arithmetic 




50 
45 
50 
60 
85 
90 
100 

1,155 
45 

1,200 
2 


200 

30 

50 

60 

85 

75 

150 

1,320 

45 

1,350 

2.40 


200 


Nature study and physiology 


45 

50 

60 

85 

90 

100 

1,055 

145 

1,200 

2 


30 


Physical exercise 


50 


Manual arts 


120 


Music 


85 


Drawing . . . 


75 


Intermissions 


150 


Total assignment per week 


1,500 


Minutes unassigned 


Minutes for school use 


1,500 
3 


1,500 


Close at (p. m.) 


3 







General suggestions. — For school use each week there are 1,200 minutes in 
each of the first and second grades, 1,350 minutes in the tliird, and 1,500 minutes 
in eacli of the remaining grades. Tlie suggested allotment leaves a margin of 
reserve time in several of the grades which the teacher should bring to bear on 
the weak places of her work. The exigencies of schoolroom work will necessi- 
tate a shift in emphasis from time to time, but it is thought that with an approxi- 
mation to the foregoing schedule all the work outlined in the course, after it gets 
to working smoothly, can be covered nicely. Later in the term it may seem 
advisable to alter this schedule somewhat. The schedule and the suggestions 
which follow presume that two classes are seated in each room. Where there 
is but one grade in a room the teacher will find it advisable to do much indi- 
vidual work with her pupils. 

Opening exercises. — No set time has been allowed in this schedule for " opening 
exercises," for we feel that the time is too frequently wasted. Unless the 
teacher is determined to make it count for something and is willing to make 
special preparation for it, we think it better for her to forego any exercises and 
begin on the regular work of the day. If, however, the teacher feels that she can 
use 10 minutes of the time profitably, she will find that it can be taken without 
interfering with the preceding time apportionment. 

Penmanship. — Where there are two classes in the room they should be com- 
bined during the writing period except, perhaps, in the primary grades. In the 
lower primary grades the writing period should be very short to avoid fatigue. 
In grades 3, 4, and 5 a 16-minute period daily should be given, in the sixth grade 
four 15-minute periods are allowed. 

Drawing. — ^Where there are two classes in the room, combine for this work. 
Because of the time required to get the materials ready for use it is best to break 
the weekly time allotment into not more than three periods. Some of the 
teachers have only two periods, while others, again, prefer taking but one period 
and increasing the time proportionately. 

Music. — The time allotment given to this subject permits, in the first and 
second grades, five 17-minute periods per week ; in the remaining grades, four 
15-minute periods per week should be given to class instruction and one 25-minute 
period to the chorus singing. It is expected, in the chorus work, that two or more 
classes of like grade be combined. 



5980°— 16- 



-12 



172 REOEGAN-IZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Arithmetic. — In the drill work, if the two classes combined are found to be 
unwieldy, the room can be handled in two sections by requiring one section to do 
written drill work while the other section is taken for the oral work or work 
at the blackboard. In the work on " applications " some teachers get satisfactory 
results by taking the room by rows, one row at a time. While the teacher is 
working with a given row the remaining ones are busy making preparation on the 
assigned work. This time allotment is quite sufficient for the essentials of arith- 
metic if the work be quick, snappy, and well thought out. 

Geography, — Sufficient time is set aside to justify the devoting of a few min- 
utes each day to the formal part of geography ; that is to say, to locations and 
map inferences. It is to be understood that the important part of geography 
comprises the conceptions and ideas which make up the content of the subject. 
Nevertheless, clear notions of geography can be gained only through establishing 
mental images of the great land and water masses of the world in their true 
space relations. This can be secured only through devising a methodology which 
will give these results. 

Spelling — Five 12-minute periods should be given to this work in the second 
and third grades ; 14 minutes in grades 4, 5, and 6. Time can be economized by 
dictating to both classes during the period. 

History. — In the sixth grade five 28-minute periods are provided, and in the 
fifth grade four 30-minute periods. From time to time it will be well to take some 
time from reading and literature, in case the ground outlined in this subject can 
not be covered otherwise. History work in the second, third, and fourth grades 
must be made largely^ story -telling, which can be varied as the needs require. 

Reading and literature. — The allotment provides for four 25-minute periods in 
the fifth and sixth grades, classes taken separately ; and for five 24-minute 
periods in the third and fourth grades with a correspondingly larger allotment in 
the first and second. Frequently the work in reading and literature can be com- 
bined with history and geography, thus securing a greater measure of time for 
one or the other as the need indicates. 

Language. — At least four 20-minute periods per week should be given to lan- 
guage work in the fifth and sixth grades, classes separate. The* classes in the 
lower grades may be combined to advantage for a portion of the formal review 
work ; thus a considerable saving in time can be effected. 

Physical exercise. — The time allotted calls for two 5-minute periods each day 
for physical exercises. We would suggest that another period of 5 minutes be 
taken from other work, in addition. Attention to physical training should be 
given without fail each day. 



APPENDIX. 



173 



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BEORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 






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BIBLIOGRAPHY. 

BOOKS AND ARTICLES TO WHICH SPECIFIC REFERENCE HAS BEEN MADE. 



Adams, Francis. The Free School System of the United States. London, 1875. 
Adams, H. B. Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia. Washington, 

1888. (U. S. Bureau of Education.) 
Adams, Jotm Quincy. Educational Reform in Silesia hy Frederick II. Am. Jo. 

Ed. (1867-8), vol. 17, pp. 125-128. 
Albree, John. Charles Brooks and His Work for 'Normal Schools. Medford, 1907. 
Allen, William. Memoir of Rev. Eleazar Wheelock, D. D. American Quarterly 

Register (1837), vol. 10, pp. 2-31. 
Allen, William H. Civics and Health. Boston, 1909. 
American Educational Conventions, Proceedings of, (1849-1852). 
Argentine Republic, Educational Progress in the. Rep. U. S. Com. Ed. (1909), 

ch. 7. 
Austria, PuMic Instruction in, (Gives an account of Felbiger's work). Am. Jo. 

Ed. (1866), vol. 16, pp. 5-32. 
Ayres, Leonard P. Laggards in Our Schools. New York, 1909. 
Ayres, Leonard. P. The Spelling Vocabularies of Personal and Business Let- 
ters. (Russell Sage Foundation), New York, 1913. 
Bache, A. D. Report on Education in Europe. Harrisburg, 1838 ; Philadelphia, 

1839. 
Baker, James H. Preliminary Report on Need of Investigation of the Culture 

Element and Economy of Time in Education. N. E. A. proceedings, 1908, 

pp. 466^78. 
Baker, James H. Report of Progress by the Committee on the Culture Element 

and Economy of Time in Education. N. E. A. proceedings, 1909, pp. 373-376 ; 

supplementary report by W. H. Smiley, pp. 377-380. 
Baker, James H. Reorganization of American Education. N. E. A. proceed- 
ings, 1911, pp. 94-103. 
Barnard, Henry. First Annual Report (Connecticut Legislature). Am. Jo. Ed. 

(1856), vol. 1, pp. 659-721. 
Barnard, Henry. Public Instruction in Saxe-Meiningen. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), 

vol. 20, pp. 605-626. 
Barnard, Henry. Public Instruction in Wurttemberg. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), pp. 

653-729. 
Berlin, Attendance and Promotions in the Schools of. Rep. U. S, Com. Ed., 1900, 

vol. 1, pp. 467-469. 
Boone, Richard G. Education in the United States. New York, 1893. 
Boston School Committee. The System of Public Education Adopted by the 

Town of Boston. Boston, 1789. 
Botta, Vincenzo. Public Instruction in Sardinia. Am. Jo. Ed. (1857), vol. 3, 

pp. 513-530 ; vol. 4, pp. 37-64 ; 479-504. 
Brookman, Thirmuthis A. Family Expense Account. New York, 1914. 

177 



178 KEOKGAOTZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

Brooks, Charles. History of the Introduction of State Normal Schools in 

America. Boston, 1864. 
Brown, Elmer E. The Making of Our Middle Schools. New York, 1903. 
Brown, John Franklin. The American High School. New York, 1909. 
Brown, J. Stanley. Present Development of Secondary Schools According to the 

Proper Plan. School Review (1905), vol. 13, pp. 15-18. 
Butler, Nicholas Murray. The Scope and Function of Secondary Education. 

Educational Review (1898), vol. 16, pp. 15-27. 
Chubb, Percival. T?ie Teaching of English. New York, 1908. 
Comenius, Johann Amos. Great Didactic. Trans, by M. W. Keating. New York, 

1911. 
Common Schools in Connecticut, containing a summary of Henry Barnard's 

Fourth Annual Report {1842). Am. Jo. Ed. (1855-56), vol. 1, pp. 669-722. 
Compayre, Gabriel. The History of Pedagogy. Trans, by W. H. Payne. Boston. 

1896. 
Compayre, Gabriel. Reform in Secondary Education in France. Educational 

Review (1903), vol. 25, pp. 130-145. 
Cousin, Victor. Report on the State of Public Instruction in Prussia. Trans. 

by Sarah Austin. London, 1834; New York, 1835. The two editions are 

exactly alike except that the New York edition contains a preface by J. 

Orville Taylor. 
Cousin, Victor. Extracts from his Report. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 

227-250. 
Day, Clive. A History of Commerce. New York, 1907. 

Davidson, Thomas. Aristotle, and Ancient Educational Ideals. New York, 1892. 
Dewey, John. Current Problems in Secondary Education. School Review 

(1902), vol. 10, pp. 13-28; discussion, pp. 28-45. 
Dexter, Edwin G. A History of Education in the United States. New York, 

1904. 
Draper, Andrew S. Fifth Annual Report. Albany, 1909. (Educational Depart- 
ment, State of New York.) 
Dutton, Samuel T. and Snedden, David S. Administration of Public Education 

in the United States. New York, 1908. 
Early School Codes of Germany. (Karl Von Raumer.) Am. Jo. Ed. (1859). 

vol. 6, pp. 426-434. 
Eberhard, Dr. Public Instruction in Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), 

vol. 20, pp. 573-604. 
Eliot, Charles W. Reports as President, in Harvard Reports. 
Eliot, Charles W. Educational Reform. New York, 1898. 
Eliot, Charles W. Undesirable and Desirable Uniformity in Schools. N. E. A. 

proceedings, 1892, pp. 82-95. 
France, Education in. Rep. U. S. Com. Ed., 1902, vol. 1, pp. 667-719. 
France, Current Tendencies in Secondary and Higher Education in. Rep. U. S. 

Com. Ed., 1910, vol. 1, w. 413-417. 
Giddings, Franklin H. The Principles of Sociology. New York, 1909. 
Gilman, Daniel C. Shortening the College Curriculum. Educational Review 

1891), vol. 1, pp. 1-7. 
Greenwood, James M. Seven-Year Course of Study for Ward-School Pupils. 

N. E. A. proceedings, 1903, pp. 247-260 ; discussion, pp. 260-263. 
Gulick, Mrs. Charlotte Emily. Emergencies. Boston, 1909. 
Hall, G. Stanley. Adolescence. 2 vol. New York, 1904. 
Hall, G. Stanley. Youth; Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene. New York, 

1906. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 179 

Hall, G. Stanley. Educational Problems. 2 vol. New York, 1911. 

Hanus, Paul H. Obstacles to Educational Progress. N. E. A. proceedings, 1902, 
pp. 157-171. 

Hanus, Paul H. A Modern School. New York, 1904, 

Harper, William R. The High School of the Future. School Review (1903), 
vol. 11, pp. 1-S. 

Hartwell, Charles S. Economy in Education. Educational Review (1905), vol. 
30, pp. 159-177. 

Hartwell, Charles S. Promotion by Subject and Three-Year Courses. School 
Review (1907), vol. 15, pp. 184-196. 

Hartwell, Charles S. Questionnaire. School Review (1907), vol. 15, pp. 313- 
316 ; tabulation of results, pp. 445^46. 

Hinsdale, B. A. The Tripartite Division of Education. School Review (1896), 
vol. 4, pp. 513-522. 

Hoag, Ernest B. Health Studies. Boston, 1909. 

Hoyt, Charles D., and Ford, R. C. John D. Pierce, Founder of the Michigan 
School System. Ypsilanti, 1905. 

Hinsdale, B. A. Horace Mann. New York, 1900. 

Italy, Public Instruction in the Kingdom of. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 
145-180. 

Italy, Progress of Education in, by Will S. Monroe, Rep. U. S. Com. Ed., 1906, 
vol. 1, pp. 73-90. 

Japan. Department of Education. Education in Japan. Prepared for the Lou- 
isiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis, 1904. 

Jenks, Henry F. Catalogue of the Boston Latin School, established in 1635, 
with an historical sketch by Henry F. Jenks. Boston, 1886. 

Kay, Joseph. Extracts from the report on the Social Condition and Education 
of the People in England and Europe. Am. Jo. Ed. (1860), vol. 8, pp. 413-434. 

Laurie, S. S. Historical Survey of Pre-Christian Education. London, 1895. 

Lewes, George H. Problems of Life and Mind : The Study of Psychology. 5 vol. 
London and Boston, 1874 and 1880. 

Low, Leopold. Die Lebensalter in der Judischen Literature. Szegedin, 1875. 
Referred to in Hall's Adolescence. 

Lyttle, E. W. Should the Twelve-Year Course of Study be Equally Divided 
Between the Elementary School and the Secondary Schools? N. E. A. pro- 
ceedings, 1905, pp. 428-436. 

Luther, Martin. Letters to the Mayors and Aldermen of all the Cities of Ger- 
many. 

Mann, Horace. Report of an Educational Tour in Germany, France, Holland, 
and Parts of Great Britain and Ireland. London, 1847. 

Mann, Horace, Extracts from the Seventh Annual Report of. Am. Jo. Ed. 
(1860), vol. 8, pp. 382-396. 

Mann, Horace, Life and Works of — (Lee & Shepard ed.) 5 vol. Boston, 1891. 

Mann, Horace. Reports of the Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of 
Education. (1838-1849.) Bardeen, Syracuse. 

Martin, George H. The Evolution of the Massachusetts Public School System. 
New York, 1894. 

Massachusetts Teacher, The. October, 1873. 

Massachusetts Legislation, 1636-1789. Rep. U. S. Com. Ed., 1892-93, vol. 2, pp. 
1225-1239. 

Massachusetts Historical Society Collections. Boston, 1806-1912. 

Maxis, Clarence. Dangers and Chemistry of Fire. State Marshal's Depart- 
ment, Ohio. 



180 REORGANIZATION" OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

McMaster, John Bach. A History of the People of the United States. 1 vol. 
New York, 1883-1900. 

Melancthon, Philip, Extracts from the Book of Visitation. (Karl Von 
Raumer.) Am. Jo. Ed. (1857), vol. 4, pp. 741-764. 

Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society. Historical Collections. Lansing, 
Michigan. 

Middle Schools of Prussia. Rep. U. S. Com. Ed., 1910, vol. 1, pp. 477^79. 

Monroe, Paul. The History of Education. New York, 1906. 

Monroe, Will S. Comenius and the Beginnings of Educational Reform. New 
York, 1900. 

New England First Fruits. Old South Leaflets, No. 51. 

Nightingale, A. F. The Plan of a Six-Year Latin Course. School Review 
(1895), VOL 3, pp. 337, 338. 

Nightingale, A. F. Results of the Chicago Experiment in Introducing Latin 
into Seventh and Eighth Grades. School Review (1898), vol. 6, pp. 379-393. 

OUn, Stephen. The Life and Letters of — 2 vol. New York, 1854. 

Ordinance of 1787, The. Old South Leaflets, No. 13. 

Pattison, Mark. Digest of his Report. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 20, pp. 
43^-444. 

Pattison, Mark. Compulsory School Attendance in Prussia. Am. Jo. Ed. 
(1870), vol. 19, pp. 617-620. 

Paulsen, Friedrich. German Education, Past and Present. Trans, by T. 
Lorenz. New York, 1908. 

Philbrick, John. Report of the Superintendent of Common Schools to the 
General Assembly (Connecticut, May, 1856). Am. Jo. Ed. (1856), vol. 2, 
pp. 469-472. 

Philbrick, John. Reports as Superintendent of the Schools of Boston in 
Reports of the School Committee of Boston, Boston. 

Philippines — Reports of the Secretary of Public Instruction and of the General 
Superintendent of Education are to be found in Reports of the Philippine 
Commission. See 1903, vol. 3; 1904, part 3; 1906, part 3; 1907, part 3; 1908. 

Plan for College Admission, The New Harvard. N. E. A. proceedings, 1911, 
pp. 567-571. 

Plan for College Admission, The New Chicago University. ■ N. E. A proceedings, 
1911, pp. 572-575. A condensed account only. 

Potter, Alonzo. The School. New York, 1842. 

Primary Education in Germany, History of. Am. Jo. Ed. (1860), vol. 8, pp. 
348-359. Rise of compulsory education in Germany described. 

Report of the Committee of Ten. New York, 1893; also U. S. Bureau Educa- 
tion, Washington, 1893. 

Report of the Committee of Fifteen on Elementary Education. New York, 1893. 

Report of the Committee on College Entrance Requirements. National Educa- 
tional Association, Winona. 

Report of the Committee on Secondary Schools (Chicago University Confer- 
ence). J. Stanley Brown, chairman. School Review (1904), vol. 12, pp. 
19-22. 

Report of the Committee on Elementary Schools (Chicago University Confer- 
ence). F. L. Soldan, chairman. School Review (1904), vol. 12, pp. 15-19. 

Report of the Committee on Colleges (Chicago University Conference). Na- 
thaniel Butler, chairman. School Review (1904), vol. 12, pp. 22-28. 
Report of the Commission of Twenty-one (Chicago University Conference). 
William R. Harper, chairman. School Review (1905), vol. 13, pp. 23-25. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 181 

Report of the Committee on an Equal Division of the Twelve Years in the 
PuMic Schools Between the District and High Schools. G. B. Morrison, 
chairman. N. E. A. proceedings, 1907, pp. 705-710. Ttie first report of tlie 
committee. 

Report of the Committee on Six-Year Course of Study. E. W. Lyttle, chair- 
man. N. E. A. proceedings, 1908, pp. 625-628. The second report of the 
standing committee. 

Report of the Committee on Six-Year Course of Study. G. B. Morrison, chair- 
man. N. E. A. proceedings, 1909, pp. 498-503. The third report of the 
standing committee. 

Report of the Committee on the Reorganization of Secondary Education (New- 
York High School Teachers' Association). C. D. Kingsley, chairman. New 
York, 1910. 

Report of the Committee of Nine on the Articulation of High School and Col- 
lege. G. D. Kingsley, chairman. N. E. A. proceedings, 1911, pp. 559-567. 

Ross, E. A. Social Psychology. New York, 1908. 

Rules of the School Committee of Boston. Boston. 

Scotland, Recent Educational Developments in. (A. P. Laurie.) Rep. U. S. 
Com. Ed., 1910, vol. 1, pp. 521-550. 

Sharpless, Isaac. English Education in the Elementary and Secondary Schools. 
New York, 1892. 

Shearman, Francis W. System of Puhlic Instruction and Primary School Law 
of Michigan. Lansing, 1852. 

Shinn, J. H. Discussion of Hill's (Charles W.), What Can be Done to Bring 
Pupils Further On in Their Studies Before They Leave School to go to 
Work? N. E. A. proceedings, 1892, pp. 658-662. 

Soldan, F. L. Shortening the Years of Elementary Schooling. School Review 
(1903), vol. 11, pp. 4-20. 

Sparks, Jared. Works of FranJclin. 10 vol. Boston, 1836-40. 

Statistics of Institutions for Secondary Instruction in the United States. Rep. 
U. S. Com. Ed., 1871, pp. 614-635. 

Stowe, Calvin. The Prussian System of PuUio Instruction and Its ApplicaUlity 
to the United States. Cincinnati, 1836. 

Stowe, Calvin. Summary of his Report, in Western Literary Institutes Trans- 
actions (Cincinnati, 1837), pp. 204-228; also, Am. Jo. Ed. (1860), vol. 8, 
pp. 371-382. 

Strayer, George Drayton. Age and Grade Census of Schools and Colleges. 
IT. S. Bureau of Education, Bulletin No. 5, 1911. 

Sturm, John. System of Instruction. (Karl Von Raumer.) Am. Jo. Ed. (1857), 
vol. 4, pp. 169-182 ; 401-415. 

Subjects and Courses of Public Instruction in Cities. Special Report of the 
Commissioner of Education. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 19, pp. 467-576. 

Swett, John. American Public Schools. New York, 1900. 

Stowe, Calvin. Report on Eletnentary Public Instruction in Europe. Boston, 
1838. 

Thorndike, Edward L, The Elimination of Pupils from School. V. S. Bureau 
of Education, Bulletin No. 4, 1907. 

Thurber, Samuel. The Order and Relation of Studies in the High School 
Course. N. E. A. proceedings, 1887, pp. 428-442. 

Thwing, Charles P. The American College in American Life. New York, 1897. 

Thwing, Charles F. History of Higher Education in America. New York, 1906. 

Trotzendorf, Valentine F., The Monitorial System of. (Karl Von Raumer.) 
Am. Jo. Ed. (1858), vol. 5, pp. 107-113. 



182 REORGANIZATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

United States Bureau of Education. Contributions to American Educational 

History, No. 18; No, 22. 
Updegraff, H. The Origin of the Moving School in Massachusetts, New York, 

1908. 
Walden, J. W. H. The Universities of Ancient Greece. New York, 1909. 
Watson, Foster. The English Grammar Schools to 1660: their Curriculum and 

Practice. University of Cambridge Press, 1908. 
Webster, William C. A General History of Commerce. Boston, New York, 1903. 
Wimmer, Hermann. Public Instruction in Saxony. Am. Jo. Ed. (1870), vol. 

20, pp. 554-564. 
Wright, John H. The Three Years' College Course. School Review (1897), vol. 

5, pp. 696-709. 
Wrightman. Annals of the Boston Primary School Committee, 



INDEX. 



Academies, Colonial period, 14-18. See also High schools. 

Adams, Francis, on education in Germany, 36. 

Adams, J. Q., on educational system of Silesia, 20. 

Age, school. See School age. 

Alameda, Cal., reorganization of school system, 82-83. 

Argentina, school system, 93. 

Aurora, 111., reorganization of school system, 80. 

Ayres, L. P., study of school elimination, 100-102, 112-113. 

Baker, President, on economy of time in education, 61-65. 

Baltimore, Md., reorganization of school system, 83-84. 

Barnard, Henry, and education in Prussia, 24 ; on grading of rural schools, 32 ; 
on maintenance of union schools, 33-34 ; on state of education in Connecti- 
cut, 18 ; work for education, 4—5. 

Berkeley, Cal., course of study, elementary schools, 171-172; course of study, 
lower high schools, 169-171 ; reorganization of school system, 87, 102-115. 

Berkeley plan. See Berkeley, Cal. 

Bibliography, 177-182. 

Boston, first steps toward segregation, 28-29. 

Boston Latin School, work and development, 76-77. 

Brookman, Thirmuthis, on study of mathematics, 147-150. 

Brooks, Charles, and Prussian system of schools, 21-22. 

Butler, N. M., on elementary and secondary periods of school life, 54-55. 

California, readjustment of courses of study, 73-74. 

Chemistry, early introduction into college curriculum, 9. 

Chicago, college preparatory schools, 77. 

Chicago, "University of, and articulation with secondary schools, 70-72; en- 
trance requirements, 71-72; high schools and academies affiliating and 
cooperating with, 56-60. 

Child-study, development, 116-119. 

City school systems, grouping of grades, 75-94. See also under names of cities. 

College entrance requirements, program of the University of Chicago, 71-72 ; 
report of committee of the National Education Association, 52-54. 

Colleges and universities, development, 5-8; early curriculum, 9-10; sectarian 
influences, 5-6; time scheme, 64. 

Colonial colleges, dominating influences, 5-6. 

Colonial education, secondary schools, 11. 

Comenius, plan of education, 42. 

Committee of Fifteen, recommendations, 50-52. 

Committee of Nine, report on secondary education, 69-70. 

Committee of Ten, recommendations, 47-52. 

Commission of Twenty-one, University of Chicago, report, 59-60. 

Concord, N. H., course of study for high schools, 165-166; early grading of 
schools, 31 ; reorganization of school system, 85-86. 

183 



184 INDEX. 

Connecticut, education, as depicted by Henry Barnard, 18; grading of rural 
schools, 32 ; union of school districts, 33-34. 

Cooking. See Home economics, 128. 

Cooper, W. J., on study of history, 150-153. 

Courses of study, elementary schools, Berkeley, Cal., 171-172; first cycle, 
116-135; second and third cycles, 136-159; for six-year high school, 163; 
high schools, 164-170 ; length, in certain cities, 35. See also under Berkeley, 
Cal.; Saginaw (East Side), Mich. 

Curriculum, colleges and universities, 9-10. 

Degrees, discussion, 62-63. 

Economics, early instruction, 9. 

Economy of time in education, 61-65. 

Elective studies, and University of Virginia, 9-10. 

Elementary education, time scheme, 64. 

Elementary schools, courses of study, 171-172 ; desirability of shortening course 
to seven years, 58 ; Japan, course of study, 173-176 ; length of course, 35-39. 

Elimination, school, investigations into, 100-102. 

Eliot, C. W., and school programs, v ; on school programs, 43-47. 

England, school system, 97-98. 

English language, study, 123, 153-157. 

Evans, C. S., on manual training, 140-142. 

Federal aid to education, 4, 8. 

France, school system, 96-97. 

Franklin, Benjamin, on education of youth, 15. 

Franklin's academy, 15. 

Garfield Junior High School, Richmond, Va., course of study, 164. 

Geography, study, 128-131. 

Germany, educational system, 25-28; length of school course, 36-39; school 
system, 19-20, 95-96. 

Graded schools, rise, 19-39. 

Grammar schools, Colonial, 14-16. 

Greek, study of, 7; value in religious training, 11-12. 

Greenwood, J. M., and schools of Kansas City, 60-61. 

Hall, G. S., and child study, 116-117; on advent of puberty, 38-39; on the 
prepubescent period, 134. 

Harper, President, on reorganization of the system of education, 56-59. 

Harris, W. T., and correlation of studies, 50. 

Harvard University, early curriculum, 9; modifying entrance requirements, 
44-45 ; requirements for admission, middle of seventeenth century 11 

Health information, 131-133. 

High schools, affiliating and cooperating with University of Chicago, 56-60; 
courses of study, 164—170 ; early conception of functions, 18 ; length of course, 
35, 42-43; preparation for college, 47-48; six-year course, 53-54, 163; the 
field and function of education in, 69-70. See also Berkeley, Cal., reorganiza- 
tion of school system. 

High schools and colleges, articulation, 70-73. 

History, instruction, 9, 125, 150-153. 

Home economics, study, 127-128, 143-145. 

Illiteracy, early, 4. 

Ireland, school system, 98. 

Italy, school system, 97. 

Ithaca, N. Y., reorganization of school system, 85. 

Jacksonville, 111., reorganization of school system, 82. 



INDEX. 185 

Japan, elementary school course, 173-176 ; school system, 93-94. 

Jefferson, Thomas, on elective system of studies, 9-10. 

Kalamazoo, Mich., reorganization of school system, 81. 

Kansas City, organization of elementary schools on seven-year basis, 60-61. 

Land grants, Federal, 4. 

Lange, A. F., on function of the high school, 64. 

Languages, modern, inaugurated by Bowdoin College in 1825, 9; recommenda- 
tions of the Committee of Ten, 48-50 ; study, 157-158. 

Latin, report of Committee of Fifteen, 51-52 ; study, 7, 48, 50, 157-158 ; value in 
religious training, 11-12. 

Latin grammar schools, New England. See Academies. 

Los Angeles, Cal., course of study for intermediate schools, 167-168; reor- 
ganization of school system, 86-87. 

Luther, Martin, on the study of Latin and Greek, 7. 

McLean, Fannie, on study of English, 153-157. 

Mann, Horace, on German schools, 25 ; work for education, 4-5. 

Manual training, 128, 140-142. 

Marshalltown, Iowa, reorganization of school system, 80. 

Massachusetts, foundation of public-school system, 2-3 ; movement toward 
graded schools, 34. 

Mathematics, study, 147-150. 

Melancthon, Philip, school plan of, 41. 

Michigan, foundation of school system, 22. 

Ministry, students, in Colonial period, 7. 

Minneapolis, Minn., reorganization of school system, 87-90. 

Mississippi Territory, extension of ordinance of 1787, 4. 

Morrill Act, provisions, 8. 

Muskegon, Mich., reorganization of school system, 80-81. 

National Education Association, and college entrance requirements, 52-54. 

New Albany, Ind., reorganization of school system, 82. 

New England, early school system, 2-5; humanistic conception of educa- 
tion, 13-14. 

New York, school sj^stem, 32-33, 90-92. 

New York City, work of Free School Society, 20-21. 

Nightingale, A. F., on the function of the secondary school in relation to the 
college period, 53-54. 

Normal schools, Prussia, 21-22. 

Northwest Territory, provision for education, 4. 

Olean, N. Y., reorganization of school system, 84. 

Olin, Stephen, on Prussian system of education, 24. 

Ordinance of 1787, provisions for education, 4, 8. 

Patriotism, instruction, 124. 

Pattison, Mark, on primary education in Germany, 38. 

Peabody, Mass., reorganization of school system, 79-80. 

Pennsylvania, foundation of academies, in Colonial period, 15. 

Pennsylvania, University of, early instruction in chemistry, 9. 

Philbrick, J. D., on education in Germany, 26. 

Philippine Islands, reorganization of school system, 92-93. 

Pierce, J. D., and educational system of Prussia, 22-24. 

Potter, Alonzo, on New York school system, 32-33. 

Prentiss, Bertha C, on vocational education, 143-145. 

Preparatory schools, college, 77-79. 

Providence, R. I., college preparatory schools, 78-79. 



186 INDEX. 

Prussia, system of education, 21-25. See also Germany. 

Quincy Scliool, Boston, establisliment, 29-30. 

Rahway, N. J., reorganization of scliool system, 85. 

Reading, instruction, 124. 

Religious instruction, principal aim of tlie colonial college, 7. 

Richmond, Ind., reorganization of school system, 85. 

Roanoke, Va., reorganization of school system, 81-82. 

Rome, ancient, education of children, 41. 

Saginaw, Mich., reorganization of school system, 82; (East Side), course of 

study, 160-162. 
School age, legal, in certain cities, 35. 
School districts, union, Connecticut, 33-34. 
School mortality, study, Berkeley, Cal., 112-115. 
School systems, reorganization, 40-45, 79-94. 
Science, instruction, 125-127, 158-159. 
Scotland, school system, 98. 
Secondary education, time scheme, 64. 
Secondary schools, colonial period, 11; function of, in relation to the college 

period, 53-54. See also High schools. 
Selma, Ala., reorganization of school system, 80. 
Sewing. See Home economics. 

Shearman, F. W., on Prussian system of public education, 23. 
Six-and-six plan, summary of reasons advanced for, 66-68. 
Stowe, O. E., on education in Prussia, 24, 36-37. 
Thorndike, E. L., on study of school elimination, 100-102. 
Union schools, 33-34. 

University of Cliicago. See Chicago, University of. 
University of Pennsylvania. See Pennsylvania, University of. 
Virginia, University of, elective studies, 9-10. 
Vocational education, 137-146. 

Webster, Mass., reorganization of school system, 80. 
William and Mary College, early instruction in history, 9 ; foundation, 5. 



BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF EDUCATION. 

[Note.— With the exceptions indicated, the documents named below will be sent free of charge upon 
application to the Commissioner of Education, Washington, D. C. Those marked with an asterisk (*) 
are no longer available for free distribution, but may be had of the Superintendent of Documents, Govern- 
ment Printing Office, Washington, D. C, upon payment of the price stated. Remittances should be made 
in coin, currency, or money order. Stamps are not accepted. Numbers omitted are out of print.] 

1906. 

*No. 3. State school systems: Legislation and judicial decisions relating to public education, Oct. 1, 1904, 
to Oct. 1, 1906. Edward C. Elliott. IScts. 

1908. 

*No. 6. The apprenticeship system in its relation to industrial education. Carroll D. Wright. 15 cts. 
No. 8. Statistics of State universities and other institutions of higher education partially supported by 
the State, 1907-8. 

1909. 

No. 2. Admission of Chinese students to American colleges. John Fryer. 
*No. 3. Daily meals of school children. Caroline L. Hunt. 10 cts. 
No. 5. Statistics of public, society, and school libraries in 1908. 
No. 7. Index to the Reports of the Commissioner of Education, 1867-1907. 
No. 8. A teacher's professional library. Classified list of 100 titles. 5 cts. 
*No. 10. Education for efficiency in railroad service. J. Shirley Eaton. 

*No. 11. Statistics of State universities and other institutions of higher education partially supported by 
the State, 1908-9. 5 cts. 

1910. 

No. 2. State school systems: III. Legislation and judicial decisions relating to public education, Oct. 1, 

1908, to Oct. 1, 1909. Edward C. Elliott. 
*No. 5. American schooUiouses. Fletcher B. Dresslar. 75 cts. 

1911. 

*No. 1. Bibliography of science teaching. 5 cts. 

*No. 3. Agencies for the improvement of teachers in service. William C. Ruediger. 15 cts. 

*No. 4. Report of the commission appointed to study the system of education in the public schools of 

Baltimore. 10 cts. 
*No. 5. Age and grade census of schools and colleges. George D. Stray er. 10 cts. 
*No. 6. Graduate work in mathematics in universities and in other institutions of like grade in the United 

States. 5 cts. 
*No. 7. Undergraduate work in mathematics in colleges and universities. 

*No. 9. Mathematics in the technological schools of collegiate grade in the United States. 5 cts. 
*No. 13. Mathematics in the elementary schools of the United States. 15 cts. 
*No. 14. Provision for exceptional children in the public schools. J. H. Van Sickle, Lightner Witmer, 

and Leonard P. Ayres. 10 cts. 
*No. 15. Educational system of China as recently reconstnicted. Harry E. King. 10 cts. 
*No. 19. Statistics of State universities and other institutions of higher education partially supported by 

the State, 1910-11. 5 cts. 

1912. 

*No. 1. A course of study for the preparation of rural-school teachers. F. Mutchler and W. J. Craig. 5cts. 

No. 2. Mathematics at West Point and Annapolis. 
*No. 3. Report of committee on uniform records and reports. 5 cts. 
*No. 4. Mathematics in technical secondary schools in the United States. 5 cts. 
*No. 5. A study of expenses of city school systems. Harlan Updegraff. 10 cts. 
*No. 6. Agricultural education in secondary schools. 10 cts. 
*No. 7. Educational status of nursing. M. Adelaide Nutting. 10 cts. 
*No. 9. Country schools for city boys, William S. Myers. 10 cts. 

No. 11. Current educational topics. No. I. 

*No. 13. Influences tending to improve the work of the teacher ol mathematics. 5 cts. 
*No. 14. Report of the American commissioners of the International commission on the teaching of mathe- 
matics. 10 cts. 

5930°— 16 13 I 



n BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF EDUCATION. 

*No. 17. The Montessori system of education. Anna T. Smith. 5 cts. 

*No. 18. Teaching language through agriculture and domestic science. M. A. Leiper. 5 cts. 

*No. 19. Professional distribution of college and imiversity graduates. Bailey B. Burritt. 10 cts. 

*No. 20. Readjustment of a rural high school to the needs of the community. H.A.Brown. 10 cts. 

*No. 22. Public and private high schools. 25 cts. 

*No. 23. Special collections in libraries in the United States. W. D. Johnston and L G. Mudge. 10 cts. 

No. 26. Bibliography of child study for the years 1910-11. 

No. 27. History of public-school education in Arkansas. Stephen B. Weeks. 
*No. 28. Cultivating school grounds in Wake County, N. C. ZebulonJudd. Sets. 

No. 29. Bibliography of the teaching of mathematics, 1900-1912. D. E. Smith and C. Goldziher. 
*No. 30. Latin-American universities and special schools. Edgar E. Brandon. 30 cts. 

1913. 

No. 1. Monthly record of ciu-rent educational publications, January, 1913. 
*No. 2. Training courses for rural teachers. A. C. Monahan and R. U. Wright. 5 cts. 
*No. 3. The teaching of modern languages in the United States. Charles H. Handschin. 15 cts. 
*No. 4. Present standards of higher education in the United States. George E. Macl^ean. 20 cts. 

No. 5. Monthly record of current educational publications. February, 1913. 
*No. 6. Agricultural instruction in high schools. C. H. Robison and F. B. Jenks. 10 cts. 
*No. 7. College entrance requirements. Clarence D. Kingsley. 15 cts. 
*No. 8. The status of rural education in the United States. A. C. Monahan. 15 cts. 
*No. 9. Consular reports on continuation schools in Prussia. 5 cts. 

No. 11. Monthly record of current educational publications, April, 1913. 
*No. 12. The promotion of peace. Fannie Fern Andrews. 10 cts. 

*No. 13. Standards and tests for measuring the efhciency of schools or systems of schools. 5 cts. 
*No. 14. Agricultural instruction in secondary schools. 10 cts. 

No. 15. Monthly record of current educational publications. May, 1913. 
*No. 16. Bibliography of medical inspection and health supervision. 15 cts. 
*No. 17. A trade school for girls. A preliminary investigation in a typical manufacturing city, Worcester, 

Mass. 10 cts. 
*No. 18. The fifteenth international congress on hygiene and demography. Fletcher B. Dresslar. 10 cts. 
*Xo. 19. German industrial education and its lessons for the United States. Holmes Beckwith. 15cts. 
*No. 20. Illiteracy in the United States. 10 cts. 

No. 21. Monthly record of current educational publications, June, 1913. 
*No. 22. Bibliography of industrial, vocational, and trade education. 10 cts. 
*No. 23. The Georgia club at the State Normal School, Athens, Ga., for the study of rural sociology. E. C. 

Branson. 10 cts. 
*No. 24. A comparison of public education in Germany and in the United States. Georg Kerschensteiner. 

Sets. 
*No. 25. Industrial education in Columbus, Ga. Roland B. Daniel. 5 cts. 
*No. 26. Good roads arbor day. Susan B. Sipe. 10 cts. 
*No. 28. Expressions on education by American statesmen and publicists. 5 cts. 

No. 29. Accredited secondary schools in the United States. Kendric C. Babcock. 10 cts. 
*No. 30. Education in the South. 10 cts. 
*No. 31. Special features in city school systems. 10 cts. 
*No. 34. Pension systems in Great Britain. Raymond W. Sies. 10 cts. 
*No. 35. A list of books suited to a high-school library. 15 cts. 
*No. 36. Report on the work of the Bureau of Education for the natives of Alaska, 1911-12. 10 cts. 

No. 37. Monthly record of current educational publications, October, 1913. 
*No. 38. Economy of time in education. 10 cts. 

*No 40. The reorganized school playground. Henry &. Curtis. 10 cts. 
*No. 41. The reorganization of secondary education. 10 cts. 

*No. 42. An experimental rural school at Winthrop College. H. S. Browne. 10 cts. 
*Xo. 43. Agriculture and rural-life day; material for its observance. Eugene C. Brooks. 10 cts. 
*No. 44. Organized health work in schools. E. B. Hoag. 10 cts. 

No. 45. Monthly record of current educational publications, November, 1913. 
*No. 46. Educational directory, 1913. 15 cts. 

*No. 47. Teaching material in Government publications. F. K. Noyes. 10 cts. 
*No. 48. School hygiene. W. Carson Ryan, jr. 15 cts. 

No. 49. The Farragut School, a Tennessee country-life high school. A. C. Monahan and A. Phillips. 
*No. 50. The Fitchbm-g plan of cooperative industrial education. M. R. McCann. 10 cts. 
*No. 51. Education of the immigrant. 10 cts. 
*No. 52. Sanitary schoolhouses. Legal requirements in Indiana and Ohio. 5 cts. 

No. 53. Monthly record of current educational publications, December, 1913. 

No. 51. Consular reports on industrial education in Germany. 

No. 55. Legislation and judicial decisions relating to education, Oct. 1, 1909, to Oct. 1, 1912. James C. 
Boykin and William R. Hood. 

No. 58. Educational system of rural Denmark. Harold W. Foght. 

No. 59. Bibliography of education for 1910-11. 



BULLETIlSr OF THE BUEEAU OF EDUCATION. Ill 

No. 60. Statistics of State universities and other Institutions of higher education partially supported by 
the State, 1912-13. 

1914. 

No. 2. Compulsory school attendance. 

No. 3. Monthly record of current educational publications, February, 1914. 

No. 4. The school and the start in life. Meyer Bloomfield. 

No. 5. The folk high schools of Denmark. L. L. Friend. 
*No. 6. Kindergartens in the United States. 20 cts. 

No. 7. Monthly record of current educational publications, March, 1914. 
*No. 8. The Massachusetts home-project plan of vocational agricultural education. R.W. Stimson. 15 cts. 

No. 9. Monthly record of current educational publications, April, 1914. 

No. 10. Physical growth and school progress. B. T. Baldwin. 
*No. 11. Montlily record of current educational publications, May, 1914. 5 cts. 
*No. 12. Rural schoolhouses and grounds. F. B. Dresslar. 50 cts. 

No. 13. Present status of drawing and art in the elementary and secondary schools of the United States. 
Royal B. Farnum. 

No. 14. Vocational guidance. 

No. 15. Monthly record of current educational publications. Index. 

No. 16. The tangible rewards of teaching. James C. Boykin and Roberta King. 

No. 17. Sanitary survey ot the schools of Orange Countj', Va. Roy K. Flannagan. 
*No. 18. The public school system ot Gary, Ind. William P. Burris. 15 cts. 

No. 19. University extension in the United States. Louis E. Reber. 

No. 20. The rural school and hookworm disease. J. A. Ferrell. 

No. 21. Monthly record of current educational publications, September, 1914. 

No. 22. The Danish folk high schools. H. W. Foght. 

No. 23. Some trade schools in Europe. Frank L. Glynn. 
*No. 24. Danish elementary rural schools. H. W. Foght. 10 cts. 

No. 25. Important features in rural school improvement. W. T. Hodges. 

No. 26. Monthly record of current educational publications, October, 1914. 
*No. 27. Agricultural teaching. 15 cts. 

No. 28. The Montessori method and the kindergarten. Elizabeth Harrison. 

No. 29. The kindergarten in benevolent institutions. 
*No. 30. Consolidation of nural schools and transportation of pupils at public expense. A. C. Monahan. 

25 cts. 
*No. 31. Report on the work of the Bureau of Education for the natives of Alaska. 25 cts. 

No. 32. Bibliography of the relation of secondary schools to higher education. R. I. "Walkley. 

No. 33. Music in the public schools. Will Earhart. 

No. 34. Library instruction in universities, colleges, and normal schools. Henry R. Evans. 
*No. 35. The training of teachers in England, Scotland, and Germany. Charles H. Judd. 10 cts. 

No. 36. Education for the home — Part I. General statement. Benjamin R. Andrews. 

No. 37. Education for the home — Part II. State legislation, schools, agencies. B. R. Andrews. 

No. 38. Education for the home — Part III. Colleges and universities. Benjamin R. Andrews. 
*No. 39. Education for the home — Part IV. Bibliography, list of schools. B.R.Andrews. ID cts. 

No. 40. Care of the health of boys in Girard College, Philadelphia, Pa. 

No. 41. Monthly record of current educational publications, November, 1914. 

No. 42. Monthly record of current educational publications, December, 1914. 
*No. 43. Educational directory, 1914-15. 20 cts. 

No. 44. County-unit organization for the administration of niral schools. A. C. Monahan. 
*No. 45. Curricula in mathematics. J. C. Brown. 10 cts. 
*No. 46. School savings banks. Mrs. Sara L. Oberholtzer. 5 cts. 

No. 47. City training schools for teachers. Frank A. Manny. 

No. 48. The educational museum of the St. Louis public schools. C. G. Rathman. 

No. 49. Efficiency and preparation of rural-schoolteachers. H. W. Foght. 

No. 50. Statistics of State universities and State colleges. 

1915. 

*No. 1. Cooking in the vocational school. Iris P. O'Leary. 5 cts. 
No. 2. Monthly record of current educational publications, January, 1915. 
No. 3. Monthly record of cm-rent educational publications, February, 1915. 
No. 4. The health of school children. W. H. Heck. 
No. 5. Organization of State departments of education. A. C. Monahan. 
No. 6. A study of the colleges and high schools in the North Central Association. 
No. 7. Accredited secondary schools in the United States. Samuel P. Capen. 
No. 8. Present status of the honor system in colleges and universities. Bird T. Baldwin. 
No. 9. Monthly record of current educational publications, March, 1915. 
No. 10. Monthly record of current educational publications, April, 1915- 



rV BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF EDUCATION. 

No. 11. A statistical study of tho public-school systems of the southern Appalachian Mountains. Nor- 
man Frost. 

No. 12. History of public-school education in Alabama. Stephen B. Weeks. 

No. 13. The schoolhouse as the polling place. E. J. Ward. 

No. 14. Monthly record of current educational publications. May, 191.5. 
*No. 15. Monthlyrecordofcurrent educational publications. Index, February, 1914-January, 1915. 5cts. 

No. 16. Monthly record of current educational publications, Jime, 1915. 

No. 17. Civic education in elementary schools as illustrated in Indianapolis. Arthur W. Dmm. 

No. 18. Legal education in Great Britain. H. S. Richards. 
*No. 19. Statistics of agricultural, manual training, and industrial schools, 1913-14. 10 cts. 

No. 20. The rural school system of Minnesota. H. W. Foght. 

No. 21. Schoolhouse sanitation. William A. Cook. 

No. 22. State versus local control of elementary education. T. L. MacDowell. 
*No. 23. The teaching of community civics. 10 cts. 

No. 24. Adjustment between kindergarten and first grade. Luella A. Palmer. 

No. 25. Public, society, and school libraries. 

No. 26. Secondary schools in the States of Central America, South America, and the West Indies. Anna 
T. Smith. 

No. 27. Opportunities for foreign students at colleges and universities in the United States. Samuel P. 
Capen. 

No. 28. The extension of public education. Clarence A. Perry. 

No. 29. The truant problem and the parental school. James S. Hiatt. 

No. 30. Bibliography of education for 1911-12. 

No. 31. A comparative study of salaries of teachers and school officers. 

No. 32. The school system of Ontario. H. W. Foght. 

No. 33. Problems of vocational education in Germany. George E. Myers. 
*No. 34. Monthly record of current educational publications, September, 1915. 5 cts. 

No. 35. Mathematics in the lower and middle commercial and industrial schools. E. H. Taylor. 

No. 36. Free textbooks and State uniformity. A. C. Monahan. 

No. 37. Some foreign educational surveys. James Mahoney. 

No. 38. The university and the municipality. 

No. 39. The training of elementary school teachers in mathematics. I. L. Kandel. 

No. 40. Monthly record of current educational publications, October, 1915. 

No. 41. Significant school-extension records. Clarence A. Perry. 

No. 42. Advancement of the teacher with the class. James Mahoney. 

No. 43. Educational directory, 1915-16. 

No. 44. School administrations in the smaller cities. W. S. Deflenbaugh. 

No. 45. The Danish people's high school. Martin Hegland. 

No. 46. Monthly record of current educational publications, November, 1915. 

No. 47. Digest of State laws relating to public education. Hood, Weeks, and Ford. 

No. 48. Report on the work of the Bureau of Education for the natives of Alaska, 1913-14. 

No. 49. Monthly record of current educational publications, December, 1915. 

No. 50. Health of school children. W. H. Heck. 

1916. 

No. 1. Education exhibits at the Panama-Paciflc International Exposition. W. Carson Ryan, jr. 

No. 2. Agricultural and rural education at the Panama-Paciflc International Exposition. H. W. Foght. 

No. 3. Placement of children in the elementary grades. K. J. Hoke. 

No. 4. Monthly record of current educational publications, January, 1916. 

No. 5. Kindergarten training schools. 

No. 6. Statistics of State universities and State colleges, 1915. 

No. 7. Monthly record of current educational publications, February, 1916. 



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